The Dow tumbled 253.25 points or 1.4% to 17,495.84, the Nasdaq slumped 68.58 points or 1.4% to 5,002.55 and the S&P 500 plunged 31.18 points or 1.5% to 2,041.89. Volume was weaker across the board. While the unemployment rate has fallen to multi-year lows, inflation remains stuck below the Fed’s 2 percent target. The contract rose $1.04, or 2.9 percent, to settle at $37.35 a barrel on Thursday but overall oil is down about 30 percent in 2015 and is at its lowest in more than six years.
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“Investors continue to struggle with the notion of the strength in the USA economy, in the context of this performance within global conditions that are mixed at best”, said Mark Luschini, chief investment strategist at Janney Montgomery Scott in Philadelphia.
The broader Topix fell 1.8 percent to 1,537.10, with about 3.0 billion shares changing hands, the biggest level since late August.
The S&P is up 14.17 points, or 0.7 percent.
The pan-European FTSEurofirst 300 index was down 0.6 percent by 1144 GMT, while the euro zone’s blue-chip Euro STOXX 50 index weakened 0.9 percent.
USA stocks dropped Thursday on persistent concern over faltering global economic growth, led by declines in energy and materials shares, a day after shares had rallied on the Federal Reserve’s decision to raise interest rates. At the same time, investors were encouraged that the Fed emphasized that further increases will be gradual. Japan’s Nikkei 225 index jumped 2.6 percent to close at 19,049.91 and South Korea’s Kospi climbed 1.8 percent to 1,969.40.
Among other decliners, Oracle (ORCL.N) was down 5.1 percent at $36.93 after its third-quarter profit forecast disappointed.
Declining issues outnumbered advancing ones on the NYSE by 1,704 to 1,215.
Since then, the US stock market has staged a spectacular bull-run, with the S&P 500 index more than doubling and the Nasdaq composite index briefly breaching its dotcom boom highs.
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The S&P 500 posted 12 new 52-week highs and 22 new lows; the Nasdaq recorded 43 new highs and 87 new lows.
