Stocks slide on drop in oil and commodities

Stocks opened with a slide Monday, pulled down by declines in energy and mining companies as prices for oil and other commodities fall.

Exxon Mobil fell 1.5 percent in early trading, the most in the Dow Jones industrial average. Mining company Freeport-McMoRan sank 7 percent.

At midmorning on Wall Street, the Dow had fallen 96 points, about 0.6 percent, to 17,455.7. The Standard & Poor’s 500 index was down 13.8 points, about 0.7 percent, at 2,046.9. The Nasdaq composite lost 35.2 points, about 0.7 percent, to 5,013.6.

The price of U.S. benchmark crude oil fell almost 3 percent to $37 a barrel in trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

Bond prices rose. The yield on the 10-year Treasury note fell to 2.24 percent.