Business Highlights

Sales of inexpensive foreclosures and other distressed low-end properties have even sparked bidding wars in places like Las Vegas, Phoenix and Miami. But the market for high-end properties is at a virtual standstill, mainly because it remains difficult to get a mortgage for expensive homes.

The National Association of Realtors said Wednesday that home sales rose 2.9 percent to an annual rate of 4.68 million in April from a downwardly revised pace of 4.55 million in March.

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Slumping Treasury bond prices send stocks lower

NEW YORK (AP) — The stock market put its rally back on hold as investors grew worried about rising borrowing costs.

The Dow Jones industrial average fell nearly 175 points Wednesday, erasing most of a rally from the day before as a jump in government bond yields fanned worries that higher interest rates will sap strength from the economy.

A steep drop in the price of the benchmark 10-year Treasury note pushed its yield up to 3.72 percent, up from 3.55 percent late Tuesday and to the highest level since November.