US Markets Trading Sharply Lower After Oil Prices Plunge
(ABC News) — The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped as much as 400 points today after oil prices fell below $30 a barrel. Oil prices are now trading at 12-year lows.
New oil supplies from Iran, which is starting to ramp up production after an easing of international sanctions, will continue to put downward pressure on global oil prices.
All 30 stocks in the Dow are trading lower. The Dow is on track for its worst month since February 2009.
The Nasdaq is off 10 percent, its worst month since 2008. The S&P 500 is now in a correction, or a decline of 10 percent from its peak.
Stocks have given up the gains from yesterday’s rally, when a recovery in oil prices led to the broad market rebound.
Investors snapped up stocks after St. Louis Fed President James Bullard intimated that the central bank might hold off on raising interest rates at its next policy-making meeting.
“This argument still holds, but it now appears that this process will take longer than previously thought,” Bullard said Thursday in a speech.
The precipitous drop in oil prices has largely been blamed on the slowing Chinese economy. China’s main stock market, the Shanghai Composite Index, has fallen 20 percent from its recent market high.
