The National Association of Manufacturers and other business groups expressed their concerns in a letter that was still being circulated on Wednesday to collect more signatures. It was expected to be sent to the White House within days.

"The government of India is discriminating against a wide range of U.S. exports, jeopardizing domestic jobs and putting at risk a growing bilateral trading relationship worth more than $60 billion last year," the groups said.

"These actions are unacceptable for a responsible middle-income country and rising global power," the groups said.

The letter is the latest sign of U.S. business frustration with Indian industrial policies that throw barriers to imports in bid to create domestic jobs.

"We urge the U.S. government immediately to initiate bilateral engagement at the highest levels and to coordinate closely with the European Union and other like-minded economies. If this engagement is not fruitful, we ask the U.S. government to respond purposefully, using all available trade tools and diplomatic engagement," the letter said.

The flurry of activity comes one day before White House international economic affairs adviser Michael Froman is scheduled to testify before the Senate Finance Committee on his nomination to be the next U.S. Trade Representative.

During that hearing, Froman could face question on an array of trade concerns, including Indian government policies.

The Washington-based Information Technology & Innovation Foundation in a recent paper accused the Indian government of "stripping" foreign biopharmaceutical companies of valuable patent protections and imposing local content requirements that could potentially block foreign equipment manufacturers from a huge section of the Indian market.

Linda Dempsey, vice president for international economic affairs at the National Association of Manufacturers, said business leaders want U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry to raise the concerns when he travels to India later this month for high-level talks.

"To have the type of strategic relationship that our government wants, we need to get these very important commercial and economic issues dealt with," Dempsey said.

"We all want to see manufacturing grow there in the United States. This is a threat to that ... To have other countries flout the economic system, to try to grow their economy at the expense of ours," she said.

(Reporting by Doug Palmer; Editing by Sandra Maler and Cynthia Osterman)

The revelations that the National Security Agency is perusing millions of U.S. customer phone records at Verizon Communications and snooping on the digital communications stored by nine major Internet services illustrate how aggressively personal data is being collected and analyzed.

Verizon is handing over so-called metadata, excerpts from millions of U.S. customer records, to the NSA under an order issued by the secretive Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, according to a report in the British newspaper The Guardian. The report was confirmed Thursday by Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., who chairs the Senate Intelligence Committee.

Former NSA employee William Binney told The Associated Press that he estimates the agency collects records on 3 billion phone calls each day.

The NSA and FBI appear to be looking even wider under a clandestine program code-named "PRISM" that was revealed in stories posted late Thursday by The Washington Post and The Guardian.

PRISM gives the U.S. government access to email, documents, audio, video, photographs and other data belonging to foreigners on foreign soil who are under investigation, according to The Washington Post. The newspaper said it reviewed a confidential roster of companies and services participating in PRISM. The companies included AOL Inc., Apple Inc., Facebook Inc., Google Inc., Microsoft Corp., Yahoo Inc., Skype, YouTube and Paltalk.

In statements, Apple, Facebook, Google, Microsoft, Yahoo, AOL and Paltalk all said they only provide the government with user data required under the law. (Google runs YouTube and Microsoft owns Skype.)

The NSA isn't getting customer names or the content of phone conversations under the Verizon court order, but that doesn't mean the information can't be tied to other data coming in through the PRISM program to look into people's lives, according to experts.

Like pieces of a puzzle, the bits and bytes left behind from people's electronic interactions can be cobbled together to draw conclusions about their habits, friendships and preferences using data-mining formulas and increasingly powerful computers.

It's all part of a phenomenon known as "Big Data," a catchphrase increasingly used to describe the science of analyzing the vast amount of information collected through mobile devices, Web browsers and check-out stands. Analysts use powerful computers to detect trends and create digital dossiers about people.

The Obama administration and lawmakers privy to the NSA's surveillance say the data being collected is only dissected when there is credible evidence of a terrorist plot or other reasons to believe that national security is being threatened. The sweeping court order covers the Verizon records of every mobile and landline phone call from April 25 through July 19, according to The Guardian.

It's likely the Verizon phone records are being matched with an even broader set of data, said Forrester Research analyst Fatemeh Khatibloo.

"My sense is they are looking for network patterns," she said. "They are looking for who is connected to whom and whether they can put any timelines together. They are also probably trying to identify locations where people are calling from."

The Verizon data includes the duration of every call. Although the court order doesn't require it, experts suspect the NSA may also be getting some kind of data that helps determine the vicinity of the calls.

The location information is particularly valuable for cloak-and-dagger operations like the one the NSA is running, said Cindy Cohn, a legal director for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a digital rights group that has been fighting the government's collection of personal phone records since 2006. The foundation is currently suing over the government's collection of U.S. citizens' communications in a case that dates back to the administration of President George W. Bush.

"It's incredibly invasive," Cohn said. "This is a consequence of the fact that we have so many third parties that have accumulated significant information about our everyday lives."

It's such a rich vein of information that U.S. companies and other organizations now spend more than $2 billion each year to obtain third-party data about individuals, according to Forrester Research. The data helps businesses target potential customers. Much of this information is sold by so-called data brokers such as Acxiom Corp., a Little Rock, Ark., company that maintains extensive files about the online and offline activities of more than 500 million consumers worldwide.

The digital floodgates have opened during the past decade as the convenience and allure of the Internet and sleek smartphones have made it easier and more enjoyable for people to stay connected wherever they go.

"I don't think there has been a sea change in analytical methods as much as there has been a change in the volume, velocity and variety of information and the computing power to process it all," said Gartner analyst Douglas Laney.

In a sign of the NSA's determination to vacuum up as much data as possible, the agency has built a data center in Bluffdale, Utah that is five times larger than the U.S. Capitol all to sift through Big Data. The massive center has fed perceptions that some factions of the U.S. government are determined to build a database of all phone calls, Internet searches and emails under the guise of national security. The Washington Post's disclosure that both the NSA and FBI have the ability to burrow into computers of major Internet services will likely heighten fears that U.S. government's Big Data is creating something akin to the ever-watchful Big Brother in George Orwell's "1984" novel.

"The fact that the government can tell all the phone carriers and Internet service providers to hand over all this data sort of gives them carte blanche to build profiles of people they are targeting in a very different way than any company can," Khatibloo said.

In most instances, Internet companies such as Google, Facebook and Yahoo are taking what they learn from search requests, clicks on "like" buttons, Web surfing activity and location tracking on mobile devices to figure out what their users like and divine where they are. It's all in aid of showing users ads about products likely to pique their interest at the right time. The companies defend this kind of data mining as a consumer benefit.

Google is trying to take things a step further. It is honing its data analysis and search formulas in an attempt to anticipate what an individual might be wondering about or wanting.

Other Internet companies also use Big Data to improve their services. Video subscription service Netflix takes what it learns from each viewer's preferences to recommend movies and TV shows. Amazon.com Inc. does something similar when it highlights specific products to different shoppers visiting its site.

The federal government has the potential to know even more about people because it controls the world's biggest data bank about U.S. citizens through its collection of Social Security numbers, tax returns and health records through Medicare, said David Vladeck, a Georgetown University law professor who recently stepped down as the Federal Trade Commission's consumer protection director.

Before leaving the FTC last year, Vladeck opened an inquiry into the practices of Acxiom and other data brokers because he feared that information was being misinterpreted in ways that unfairly stereotyped people. For instance, someone might be classified as a potential health risk just because he or she bought products linked to increased chance of heart attack. The FTC inquiry into data brokers is still open.

"We had real concerns about the reliability of the data and unfair treatment by algorithm," Vladeck said.

Vladeck stressed he had no reason to believe that the NSA is misinterpreting the data it collects about people. He finds some comfort in The Guardian report that said the Verizon order had been signed by Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court Judge Roger Vinson.

The NSA "differs from a commercial enterprise in the sense that there are checks in the judicial system and in Congress," Vladeck said. "If you believe in the way our government is supposed to work, then you should have some faith that those checks are meaningful. If you are skeptical about government, then you probably don't think that kind of oversight means anything."

Biden made his remarks after meeting with President Dilma Rousseff and Vice president Michel Temer on the last leg of his three-day visit to Brazil.

"The president (Obama) wanted to make a statement of the importance that the relationship with Brazil has for us," Biden said. "That is why the first state visit of the second administration is to your president. We are pleased that your president has accepted the invitation."

"It is a sign of the respect we have for Brazil. I hope 2013 marks the beginning of a new era in the relations between our two countries," he added

The Oct. 23 visit will be an important diplomatic acknowledgment of Brazil's growing influence and also a shift back toward the middle for Brazilian foreign policy under Rousseff.

Her predecessor, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, supported the Iranian government of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Venezuela's late president Hugo Chavez, both of whom Rousseff kept at arm's length.

Brazilian Foreign Minister Antonio Patriota said U.S.-Brazil relations should "focus on areas like science, technology, innovation and education."

Biden told reporters he had a "wide-ranging discussion" with Rousseff who he said was a "leader who is laser-focused on addressing the needs of the Brazilian people. I now understand why President Obama considers her such a great partner."

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Award-winning author James Salter, who completed his last full-length book more than 30 years ago, has released a new novel that chronicles a life drawn from many of his own experiences.

Like Salter, the main character in "All That Is" leaves the military to embark on a literary career. Unlike Salter, Philip Bowman becomes an editor after failing to find work as a writer.

Salter is considered by many one of the best postwar American novelists and short-story writers. His books include "The Hunters," "Burning the Days" and "Dusk and Other Stories," for which he won the PEN/Faulkner Award in 1989.

The new book spans several decades and explores Bowman's fleeting personal relationships in a bygone era of independent, clubby publishing houses.

The 87-year-old Salter spoke to Reuters about that literary world, why he wrote the book and his writing process.

Q: How did you come up with the title and what does it signify?

A: It has two meanings and they're not the same meaning but they overlap. One is all that is to life, and the other is all that is in life. They're not exactly the same thing, but I think your understanding shifts between the two without recognizing that they're shifting. Maybe that is the way it is designed, and to the reader, that doesn't make any sense, but that is how it is meant.

Q: Given how much time has passed since your last full-length novel, what made you want to finish it now?

A: I was writing other things ... There was no professional reason. I became interested in it through editors that I knew. In the beginning, I didn't know any editors. My first book was published without any editorial advice. Nobody said you might do this or that, or why don't we see more of this. I merely took the book and published it.

It was not until I began to write a book called "Light Years" that an editor really stepped in. The editor was Joe Fox at Random House and he wound up editing a subsequent book. I got to know him very well personally as well as professionally. And through another editor after him, Robert Gay, I became gradually more interested in their lives and that world of publishing.

They are involved in leisurely things like reading books, having lunch with writers and agents - it is all really beautiful and so I thought I would write something about all of this.

Q: Can you describe the writing process behind this novel?

A: I did spend a lot of time pre-writing. I have three big notebooks as thick as your little finger filled with notes about what might be in this book - people, places, and things. It took a long time to write those and then I was paring away.

Q: The main protagonist, Philip Bowman, has very few serious attachments, whether in material possessions or relationships. What do you hope readers learn from his character?

A: No lesson but I hope they read it with pleasure. The book is the journey of a life. I suppose if you search in it as you do at the end of a course in college, you can come up with several questions. Did he learn from experience? Was he emotionally stunted? Is this an example of the moral degeneration of an era?

None of these questions is that relevant. You are not going to get an answer from the book - the book is what it is. It is meant in a way to give you some idea of the life of an editor in a publishing house - in my view, a very favorable idea. I think it is an admirable and interesting life, and being an editor can be potentially deeply satisfying.

Q: The book finishes without a definitive conclusion. How should readers think about the end of the book?

A: With the last female relationship, he says and thinks certain things regarding her. That, to me, seems to make plain that he anticipates they are going to be together for a long time. The book does not say that precisely but it does say that he wondered if they didn't get married, would they stay together.

Could they possibly have a life such as people have in art? In art, by that, I mean painters and sculptors' lives - that life of art that is superior to ordinary mores and behavior. There are levels of art and writing and they live on a certain level that I think we instinctually envy. That is the level that he said perhaps they would live on.

There is so much implied in this book that if you don't read it with your openness to its implications rather than to its literal text, then I think you would miss what this book is about.

(Editing by Elaine Lies, Patricia Reaney and Matthew Lewis)

Karzai provided no details when he spoke Thursday at a gathering on rural development. But he has said in the past that the United States must commit to boost Afghan security, strengthen its armed forces and provide long-term economic development assistance.

Karzai says the U.S. should pay for the agreement, a reference to a demand for rent to lease up to nine bases in Afghanistan. He didn't say how much money Afghanistan wants, but it's thought to be over $6 billion.

The U.S. has said it's not seeking permanent bases in Afghanistan.

The agreement is expected by year's end.

(Reuters) - Nike Inc is dropping its partnership with the Livestrong Foundation, the cancer charity founded by disgraced cyclist Lance Armstrong, the latest repercussion from the doping scandal that last year stripped him of his titles.

Nike said on Tuesday it would end production of its Livestrong gear and apparel after the 2013 holiday line, concluding a long-standing licensing agreement for footwear and apparel between the two that helped Livestrong raise a total of $100 million over the course of the partnership.

"We expected changes like this," Katherine McLane, a Livestrong spokeswoman, said in a conference call with reporters. "Could there be fallout? Of course," she said. "We remain enormously confident...We are in strong fiscal shape."

When Armstrong left Livestrong's board, Nike said it would still back the charity, but no longer sponsor the man behind it.

However, Nike spokeswoman Mary Remuzzi told Reuters late on Tuesday that the decision to drop the partnership was taken as sales of the products had not met company's expectations.

Nike also distributed Livestrong's ubiquitous yellow wrist-bands, of which 87 million were sold.

Armstrong founded Livestrong in 1997 after being diagnosed with testicular cancer. The group flourished during his cycling career in which he won the Tour de France seven times.

The cyclist, who stepped down from Livestrong's board last October, admitted in January to systematic use of banned, performance-enhancing drugs after years of denials.

"This does show there are pros and cons of (a philanthropic foundation) being so closely associated with one person," said Patrick Rooney, associate dean of academic affairs and research at the Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy.

Still, Rooney predicted a large enough number of people would be able to separate Armstrong's misdeeds and the foundation's good works that it could survive.

Livestrong said its 2013 budget is $38.4 million, a 10.9 percent reduction from 2012, but that revenue projections were ahead by 2.5 percent.

Livestrong has similar licensing deals with sports eyewear maker Oakley, owned by Italy's Luxottica and others.

Nike will benefit from distancing itself from the charity and from the scandal-tainted athlete, said Robert Boland, a professor of sport management at New York University's Tisch Center.

"Their relationship with Livestrong was so based on Lance Armstrong and his story that it's almost impossible to separate them from a branding standpoint," Boland said. "The chief thing that is motivating Nike is they're looking to move on and put their years with Lance Armstrong behind them."

(Reporting by Phil Wahba, Ellen Wulfhorst and Scott Malone; additional reporting by Sakthi Prasad; Writing by Ellen Wulfhorst; Editing by Leslie Adler, Marguerita Choy and Dan Grebler)

In the third serious derailment this month, the dozen or so rail cars, at least one carrying hazardous materials, went off the tracks at about 2 p.m. in Rosedale, a suburb east of Baltimore. A hazardous materials team responded, but Baltimore County Executive Kevin Kamenetz said at a news conference that no toxic inhalants were being released. Officials did not order an evacuation.

By nightfall, the hazmat team had left, meaning there was no more danger posed from the chemicals in the rail car, said Baltimore County police Capt. Bruce Schultz.

The truck driver, 50-year-old John J. Alban Jr., was in serious condition Tuesday night, a hospital spokeswoman said. Two CSX workers aboard weren't hurt.

Dale Walston said he lives about a half-mile away and that he thought he could smell chemicals.

"It shook my house pretty violently and knocked things off the shelves," he said in an email to The Associated Press.

The face of one warehouse near the train tracks was blown off.

Even hours after the blast, the thick plume of black smoke could be seen for miles and had drifted and covered the eastern part of Baltimore. Later, the smoke that was left had lightened considerably, changing from black to gray, though the fire wasn't yet extinguished as of 9 p.m.

CSX spokesman Gary Sease said in an email that one of the cars was carrying sodium chlorate, which the Department of Transportation classifies as a hazardous material. However, Baltimore County Fire Chief John Hohman said the chemical was not in any of the cars that were still burning into the evening. The bleaching agent is used in making paper.

Nick Materer, an Oklahoma State University chemist, said sodium chlorate, when combined with fuel, makes a more volatile mixture. "When you mix them together and add fire, they go boom," he said in a phone interview.

Materer said the chemical is usually shipped as a white powder but it can also be in a liquid solution. Either way, he said, the fumes can irritate the lungs if inhaled.

Exactly what triggered the explosion was being investigated, and Hohman said firefighters told residents of about 70 nearby homes that they could leave if they wanted to and shelter would be provided.

Two warehouses were heavily damaged by the explosion and other buildings were harmed, but none collapsed, as was thought earlier, Hohman said.

An Amtrak spokeswoman said its Northeast Corridor passenger service was not affected.

Kevin Lindemann, 29, a salesman for industrial pipe supplier Baltimore Windustrial near the tracks, said he and about 10 co-workers felt the ground shake, ran to a window and saw several cars on their sides and flames he estimated at 50 feet high.

"You could feel the heat as soon as you walked out the door," Lindemann said.

"We kind of panicked pretty quick," he said. "We didn't wait around to see what was happening. So as soon as we saw the flames I took a quick picture and got in my truck and drove away."

Everyone left the building and drove several blocks away. Then they heard the explosion, five to 10 minutes after the derailment, he said.

"Even like three blocks away, it was loud. I mean, it just about took you to your knees," Lindemann said.

Derailments have done great damage before in Baltimore, a city with countless train tracks. Twelve years ago was the derailment and chemical fire in Baltimore's Howard Street tunnel. Rail cars burned for five days underground in July 2001. Portions of downtown were closed and rail traffic across the U.S. was affected for days.

The National Transportation Safety Board and the Federal Railroad Administration were sending teams to investigate Tuesday's crash of the 45-car train en route from Selkirk, N.Y., to Waycross, Ga. It contained a variety of products from lumber to printing paper.

Police also planned to investigate the circumstances that led to the track collision, but it was not clear what, if any, charges the truck driver or anyone would face, said Baltimore County spokeswoman Elise Armacost. Police and fire officials said they were not sure how the truck got on the tracks or even whether it was at a crossing when it was hit.

Late Tuesday evening, Robert Sumwalt of the National Transportation Safety Board said the accident occurred at a private crossing where the only marking was a stop sign. He said it wasn't clear why the truck was crossing the tracks or whether it was authorized to be there.

Sumwalt said a team of 15 NTSB investigators was on the scene and would likely remain there for up to a week.

Photos showed at least a dozen rail cars off the tracks, including at least one tanker car. Sease said four of the cars believed derailed carried terephthalic acid, which is used in the production of plastics and polyester, among other things. He said it is not listed as a hazardous material.

Sumwalt said it was the chemical that exploded as a result of the derailment.

One of the cars still burning was carrying that acid, and another was carrying fluoroacetic acid, Hohman said.

Although county officials played down the health risks of the two acids, the National Institutes of Health website describes fluoroacetic acid as an "extremely toxic" constituent of many poisonous plants that is used to make products that kill rodents. It produces poisonous gases when burned, according to the NIH.

Materer said the gases contain chlorinated organics. He was less familiar with terephthalic acid but said it, too, contains chlorine.

"It just doesn't sound good," he said.

Hazardous materials moving through Baltimore and elsewhere in Maryland was the subject of an agreement a few years ago between the state and CSX. After a freight train with hazardous materials derailed in November 2007 near Camden Yards, CSX agreed to give officials real-time information about potential harmful cargo moving through the state. Railroads had previously guarded such details as proprietary information.

Also hit by a serious derailment this month was Bridgeport, Conn. On May 17, more than 70 people were injured when a commuter train went off the tracks. The eastbound train from New York City derailed during evening rush hour, came to a stop and was struck about 20 seconds later by a westbound train. In Rockview, Mo., on Saturday, a cargo train crash injured seven people and destroyed a highway overpass, which could take a year to repair.

Despite the high-profile railroad accidents, the overall number of such crashes has been declining industry wide and for CSX over the past decade.

Last year was the safest year on record for the railroad industry, according to the railroad administration. All train accidents are down 43 percent since 2003, and derailments have fallen 40 percent over the same period, according to data provided by the administration. Freight train derailments specifically are also down 40 percent.

In each of the past five years, CSX has reported more than 100 deaths in accidents and incidents involving the railroad.

CSX, based in Jacksonville, Fla., operates over 21,000 miles of track in 23 eastern states and two Canadian provinces.

Its shares traded higher Tuesday before the derailment was reported. The shares closed down 20 cents at $25.30.

Bertha Pressley and her husband Tom Brown said their townhome in Middle River, about 3 miles away, shook and they initially feared a bomb or natural disaster.

"I thought it was terrorism," Pressley said.

___

Associated Press writers Kasey Jones in Baltimore, David Dishneau in Hagerstown, Josh Funk in Omaha, Neb., and Joan Lowy in Washington, D.C., contributed to this report.

U.S. markets plummeted immediately after the opening bell Thursday following a global slump prompted partly by an unexpected slowdown in Chinese manufacturing. Concern that the Federal Reserve might ease back on its economic stimulus program sooner than expected had also riled investors.

The dip gave investors who missed this year's stock market surge an opportunity to get into the market, and by midday the market had recouped most of its early loss. Stocks even climbed into positive territory by midday, then ended the day marginally lower.

"Most institutions, most hedge funds and most individuals have watched the market go up without them, so the dips are being bought," said Jim Russell, regional investment director at U.S. Bank. "There's a very strong case for U.S. stocks."

For the most part, the U.S. stock market has been going up steadily since the beginning of the year, with only infrequent declines. Investors' optimism has been stoked by a pickup in hiring at U.S. employers, a recovery in the housing market and record profits at U.S. corporations.

All that has helped push the Dow up 16.7 percent this year. The Standard & Poor's 500 index is 15.7 percent than at the start of 2013.

On Thursday, however, trading was volatile.

The Dow Jones industrial average ended the day just 12.67 points lower, or 0.1 percent, at 15,294.50. It fell as much as 127 points during the first hour of trading.

A sell-off in global markets came after minutes from the latest Fed meeting, released Wednesday afternoon, indicated that several policymakers were leaning toward slowing the central bank's bond-buying program as early as June if the economy continues to recover.

The central bank is spending $85 billion a month buying bonds. That program has been keeping interest rates low in an effort to encourage borrowing, spending and investing. It's also meant to encourage investors to buy risky assets like stocks.

Investors were also unsettled by the report that showed manufacturing in China, the world's No. 2 economy, unexpectedly shrank this month. HSBC Corp. said the preliminary version of its monthly purchasing managers index had dropped to a seven-month low. China's booming economy has been a major driver of global growth in recent years and investors worry when they see signs that it's slowing down.

Stocks fell sharply in Asia Thursday. Japan's Nikkei index dropped 7.3 percent after news was released about the slowdown in Chinese manufacturing. The declines extended to Europe, where Germany's DAX index, which has been at a record high, slid 2.1 percent.

The sell-off looked set to continue when trading opened in New York, but the market quickly hit bottom and reversed course.

Some investors also reevaluated the concern about the Fed easing, or tapering, its economic stimulus program.

Any pullback of the Fed's stimulus should be seen as a positive signal because it would mean that the U.S. economy is getting stronger, said Joe Quinlan, chief market strategist at U.S. Trust.

"When the Fed starts to taper, the fundamentals of the U.S. economy have improved even further than we have already seen," said Quinlan. "The Fed tapering is actually a good story for U.S. equities and the economy."

Encouraging news about the U.S. economy also helped the case for stock market bulls Thursday.

Sales of new homes rose in April to the second-highest level since the summer of 2008, the Commerce Department reported Thursday. Also, the median price for a new home hit a record high, another sign that housing is recovering.

There was good news on the labor market, too.

The number of Americans applying for unemployment benefits fell 23,000 last week to 340,000, a level consistent with solid job growth, the Labor Department said. That suggests employers are laying off fewer workers. The decline in claims has coincided with steady job growth over the past six months.

In other U.S. stock trading, the Standard & Poor's 500 index closed down 4.84 points to 1,650.51, or 0.3 percent. The Nasdaq composite fell 3.88 points, or 0.1 percent, to 3,459.42.

In commodities trading, the price of crude oil fell 3 cents to $94.25 a barrel. Gold rose $24.40, or 1.8 percent, to $1,391.80 an ounce. The dollar fell against the euro and the yen.

In U.S. government bond trading, the yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury note edged down to 2.02 percent from 2.04 percent. The yield on the note falls when the bond's price rises.

Among stocks making big moves, Ralph Lauren fell $4.37, or 2.3 percent, to $183.69. The apparel seller reported revenue that fell short of what financial analysts were expecting. Sluggish economic conditions and the decision to cut certain businesses reduced sales.

PC maker Hewlett-Packard surged $3.63, or 17.1 percent, to $24.86 after the company delivered second-quarter earnings that topped the estimates of both its own management and financial analysts.

Dollar Tree rose $1.82, or 3.8 percent, to $50.19 after the discount store chain said its earnings climbed 15 percent as customers spent more. The earnings beat the expectations of Wall Street analysts who follow the company.

* Rivals Levski held 1-1 by Slavia after bizarre own goal

* Levski chief to resign, another official collapses

By Angel Krasimirov

SOFIA, May 25 (Reuters) - Ludogorets won their second straight Bulgarian league title with a 3-0 win at relegated Montana on Saturday as their main rivals Levski Sofia were held at home after scoring a bizarre own goal in a dramatic season finale.

Ludogorets thrashed Montana thanks to an early goal by Bulgaria midfielder Svetoslav Dyakov and a second-half double from substitute Mihail Alexandrov while Levski, who started with a two-point lead, were held 1-1 at home by city rivals Slavia.

Levski's title hopes were ended by defender Dimitar Vezalov 16 minutes from time when he put the ball into his own net from seven metres with no Slavia player around him after Basile de Carvalho had lifted the home side with a first-half strike.

Ludogorets finished with 72 points from 30 matches ahead of Levski on 71 with CSKA Sofia third on 63.

A few minutes after the final whistle, Levski's chief executive Ivo Tonev said he would resign while the club's financial director Konstantin Bazhdekov collapsed with suspected heat stroke and was rushed to hospital.

Ludogorets and Levski both had a chance to clinch the title on the last day of the season but the Razgrad-based club profited from their rivals' misfortune to become champions, an outcome considered "unthinkable" by the Bulgarian media.

Levski had seemed certain to win a 27th league title when their Guinea Bissau striker De Carvalho capitalised on a defensive mix-up to put them in front after 33 minutes.

But Slavia equalised against the run of play when Vezalov scored one of the strangest own goals of the season after a right-wing cross by Slavia's Japanese midfielder Daisuke Matsui.

Levski had won their previous seven league matches, including a last-gasp victory against Ludogorets, but were unable to find a winner, leaving their supporters at the Georgi Asprauhov stadium in a state of shocked silence.

"I don't feel well, we should have scored two or three goals," said Levski coach Nikolay Mitov. "It's a huge disappointment, it hurts, it's painful."

SWEET TITLE

The Eagles, as Ludogorets are known in the Balkan country, are based in a town of less than 35,000 people, but clinched their maiden championship in a domestic treble last season.

"I don't want to underestimate last year's title but this one is so sweet," said Ludogorets coach Ivaylo Petev, whose side who have lost only twice in the league this term. "We're one level above our rivals."

"Last season, we also won the title on the last day of the season, it happened again and I hope we'll win it next year too," added Petev.

Ludogorets, who were in the third division three years ago, sealed a place in next season's Champions League second qualifying round, while Levski go into the Europa League first qualifying round along with third-placed CSKA.

Four-times Bulgarian champions Lokomotiv Sofia, who have played in the top division for the last 61 seasons, escaped relegation with a 2-1 win over CSKA on Saturday.

Bulgaria's top flight will be cut by two teams to 14 next season as the domestic governing football union (BFU) tries to improve standards. (Reporting by Angel Krasimirov; Editing by Ken Ferris)

NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. stocks fell on Wednesday with the S&P 500 posting its biggest decline in three weeks, after minutes from the latest U.S. Federal Reserve meeting showed some officials were open to tapering large-scale asset purchases as early as at the June meeting.

Trading was volatile - the Dow and the S&P indexes both rose more than 1 percent during the morning, but fell more than 1 percent in the afternoon.

The minutes followed comments from Chairman Ben Bernanke, who said the Fed could decide to scale back the pace of bond purchases at one of the "next few meetings" if the economic recovery looked set to maintain forward momentum.

The comments were a blow to a market that had accelerated after Bernanke said the central bank needed to see further signs of traction in the economy before it tapered stimulus.

"This is a very sensitive market and particularly sensitive to any notion that tapering will come too soon," said Quincy Krosby, market strategist at Prudential Financial in New York.

"No one wants to be selling if the data reaches the point when the Fed begins to specifically talk about tapering. The market doesn't wait for the Fed to move. It will move before. That's how it operates."

Krosby also added that Bernanke went off-script and in his effort to be transparent, "he confused the market."

According to the minutes of the April 30-May 1 policy meeting released on Wednesday, "a number" of officials were open to tapering large-scale asset purchases as early as the June meeting, but disagreement continued on what conditions would suffice to begin that move.

One official preferred to begin decreasing purchases immediately and another wanted to add more accommodation immediately, but ultimately most felt it was important simply to be prepared to adjust the pace up or down in response to incoming data.

Investors have increasingly turned their attention to when the Fed's current $85 billion-per-month bond purchase program might end or slow. The stimulus has been a major force behind a rally in U.S. equities that has helped the S&P 500 and Dow industrials gain about 16-17 percent so far this year.

The Dow Jones industrial averagewas down 80.41 points, or 0.52 percent, at 15,307.17. The Standard & Poor's 500 Indexwas down 13.81 points, or 0.83 percent, at 1,655.35. The Nasdaq Composite Indexwas down 38.82 points, or 1.11 percent, at 3,463.30.

The S&P 500 rose as high as 1,687.18 and fell as low as 1,648.86 during Wednesday's trading session while the Dow rose as high as 15,542.40 and fell as low as 15,265.96.

"You have more volatility than you've had for a long time," said Uri Landesman, president, Platinum Partners in New York.

"The technician in me looks at a rocket shot straight up and says you could get a pretty good correction here without that much work. There aren't really solid levels of support on the way down because we broke through all of them so quickly."

All 10 sectors on the S&P 500 closed negative, with energy and utilities leading the decline. The energy sector indexfell 1.2 percent while the utilities sectorfell 1.6 percent.

After the market close, shares of Hewlett-Packard Cojumped 10 percent after the world's largest personal computer maker raised the lower end of its full-year outlook. The stock had closed up 0.6 percent at $21.23.

Bristol-Myers Squibbshares rose 5.3 percent at $46.40 after a Citi note highlighted excitement surrounding so-called immunotherapy, in the wake of positive results from clinical trials conducted by companies such as Bristol-Myers and Roche Holding .

Target Corpcited unseasonably cold weather as it reported a 0.6 percent decline in first-quarter sales at U.S. stores open at least a year. Target cut its full-year profit forecast and shares slid 4 percent to $68.40.

Toll Brothersshares rose 2.9 percent to $37.07 after the largest U.S. luxury homebuilder posted a 46 percent rise in quarterly profit, suggesting the housing recovery is picking up pace across the industry.

Volume was roughly 8.34 billion shares on the New York Stock Exchange, the Nasdaq and the NYSE MKT, exceeding the year-to-date average daily closing volume of about 6.4 billion.

Decliners outnumbered advancers on the NYSE by 2,362 to 648, while on the Nasdaq, decliners beat advancers 1,870 to 632.

(Additional reporting by Rodrigo Campos and Caroline Valetkevitch; Editing by Nick Zieminski)