Despite the rocky start to Thursday’s trading, the bulls made a respectable recovery effort. It just wasn’t a successful recovery effort. The S&P 500’s index close of 2,472.16 was 0.22% less than Wednesday’s last trade, with traders unwilling to forge further ahead into record territory. Many of them are waiting to hear Friday morning’s employment report before making any major decisions.

The bears had no problem making decisions on 3D Systems Corporation (NYSE:DDD), Centurylink Inc (NYSE:CTL) and Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd (ADR) (NYSE:TEVA) today though. These names were sold early, often and without a second thought.

Here’s the deal.

Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd (ADR) (TEVA)

In the grand scheme of things it’s not as if investors didn’t know this day of reckoning was coming. Still, there’s something about seeing it happen — with real numbers to back it up — to spook investors into action.

The short version of a long story: On Thursday, Teva Pharmaceutical shares fell a whopping 24% following the release of second-quarter results that were down due to increased competition in the U.S. generic drug space.

For the period ending in June, Teva turned an operating profit of $1.02 per share on revenue of $5.69 billion. Unfortunately, analysts were collectively expecting sales of $5.72 billion and earnings of $1.06 per share of TEVA. The company’s United States generics arm came up $89 million short of revenue expectations, as alternatives to its drugs hit the market.

The headwind was brisk enough to force Teva Pharmaceutical into cutting its full-year profit outlook. It was looking for earnings of between $4.90 and $5.30 per share, but lowered that range to something between $4.30 and $4.50.

Centurylink Inc (CTL)

Over the course of the past few days it looked like small telecom player outfit Centurylink was going to shrug off its June/July pullback and rekindle a bigger turnaround effort. Its second-quarter earnings report upended that effort before it had a chance to get going in earned.

Last quarter, Centurylink earned 46 cents per share, missing estimates of 49 cents per share of CTL. Revenue of $4.09 billion met the consensus outlook. The company also pared back its revenue guidance.

The bulk of the 5.5% setback CTL suffered on Thursday, however, has more to do with poor second-quarter results from Level 3 Communications, Inc. (NYSE:LVLT). Level 3 and Centurylink intend to merge in an effort to gain scale and augment each other’s service. But, Level 3’s second-quarter report was similarly lackluster, forcing investors to consider the possibility that Centurylink is just inheriting dead weight.

3D Systems Corporation (DDD)

Finally, although the 3D printing industry is finally maturing, its key players like 3D Systems are still struggling to turn a profit … or even meet sales expectations.

After Wednesday’s closing bell rang, 3D printer maker 3D Systems its second-quarter numbers, earning an operating profit of eight cents per share on sales of $159.5 million. Revenue was up just a bit year-over-year, but fell short of the $162.5 million analysts had modeled. Those same pros were also calling for a profit of 12 cents per share. The foreseeable future isn’t looking a whole lot better either.

Although 3D Systems swung to a profit, it’s just not yet enough for investors, who sent DDD to a loss of 21.4% today.

As of this writing, James Brumley did not hold a position in any of the aforementioned securities.