Dow Drops Amid Oil Market Plunge, Weak U.S. Economic Data

As the global economy reels from the massive announcement from Saudi Arabia, which essentially killed off any prospect of an oil production cut, the U.S. stock index futures, especially the energy sector, were hit quite hard during Wednesday trading, according to The Daily Caller. Apart from the bombshell announcement from the Middle East, investors were also discouraged by a number of weak U.S. economic data, prompting a significant number to move out of risk-sensitive assets.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average took a pretty massive hit, falling 1.3 percent, or 203 points, ending the day at 16,224 points. What was quite notable was that almost all of the Dow's blue-chip gauge's components were in the negative by day's end, reports Fox Business News.

The NASDAQ Composite Index did not fare much better either, tumbling 1.2 percent or 55 points during the day, closing at 4,448 points.

Apart from the Dow and the NASDAQ, the S&P 500 is also down 6 percent for the year, with its financial branch, which has gone down 12.5 percent during the last two months, being the worst performing sector in the entire S&P 500, reports Reuters via CNBC News.

With the energy sector being beleaguered once more, the U.S. economy might be in for yet another wild ride sooner than expected.

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Tags
Saudi Arabia, Dow, Nasdaq, S&P 500
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