By Michael Patterson
July 20 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. stocks erased a week of record highs after earnings at Google Inc. and Caterpillar Inc. missed analysts' estimates and banks predicted greater losses from bad loans.
Google, owner of the world's most-popular Internet search engine, plunged the most since February 2006 after it said rising costs cut profits. Falling demand for truck engines sent Caterpillar shares to their biggest decline in nine months, while Citigroup Inc. led a tumble in financial shares after increasing reserves for bad loans.
The Dow average dropped as much as 203 points a day after closing above 14,000 for the first time, driven by record takeovers and 19 straight quarters of U.S. profit growth above 10 percent. Concern that defaults by borrowers with limited or poor credit histories will reduce banks' earnings pushed down 89 of 92 financial firms in the Standard & Poor's 500 Index.
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