keywords: stocks sales retail profits investors
text: Stocks Fall on Poor Retail Sales, Oil NEW YORK - Disappointing retail sales and oil prices that threatened to top \$53 per barrel sent stocks lower Thursday as investors worried that rising energy costs could further hamper consumer spending.    With a number of companies having already warned that energy costs would squeeze third-quarter profits, investors saw the September retail sales report as reason to worry that a sustained rise in oil prices could harm fourth-quarter results as well...