US stocks were in the red again on Monday, with the Nasdaq leading declines as investors worried about the prospects of the Federal Reserve tipping the US economy into a recession with more monetary tightening.

The three major Wall Street indexes declined for a fourth straight day. That follows Fed Chair Jerome Powell last week adopting a hawkish tone on battling inflation with interest rate hikes even as the data shows the US economy weakening.

The Dow Jones fell 0.49 percent to 32,757, the S&P 500 lost 0.9 percent to 3,817 and the Nasdaq declined 1.49 percent to 10,546.

Sector by sector, the biggest drags on the market were communications, technology and consumer discretionary. Facebook owner Meta was down 4.14 percent after the European Commission said it could impose a fine of up to 10 percent of the tech conglomerate's annual global turnover if evidence showed an infringement of the EU's antitrust laws.

L3Harris Technologies was down 3.7 percent after the US defense contractor said it would buy hypersonic engine manufacturer Aerojet Rocketdyne Holdings for $4.7 billion. Aerojet added 1.31 percent.

Overall the US markets are on track for their worst showing this year since the 2008 financial crisis.

US Treasury yields rose on anticipation of more rate hikes to come from the Fed and from the European Central Bank. The Treasury Department will sell $12 billion in 20-year Treasuries on Wednesday and $19 billion in five-year bonds on Thursday. (Reuters)