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Stocks Plunge Anew, Led by Financials; Dow Down 873 in Two Days

Stocks plunged for a second straight day Thursday, falling to a ranges not seen in six years as financial and energy stocks tumbled and as demand for the safety of government debt spiked to historic levels

Wednesday rout brings fear of Black Monday

THE plunge in US stocks on Wednesday dealt a double blow to Wall Street investors who had been hoping not only that the market had bottomed last month, but that the massive government interventions in the US and abroad had at least stabilised financial markets.

As Wednesday's sell-off took stocks sharply below the Oct 10 market lows that strategists had been calling the bottom, and sunk the major US market indexes to fresh lows not seen in nearly six years, analysts were rushing to reverse their calls for a year-end rebound.

No way to measure a bottom from where we stand: fund manager

There's a view that even if stocks don't go down sharply by Friday, there is a danger that the market dynamics may already be in place for a 'Black Monday' sort of scenario when traders come back from their weekend break.

As the closing bell sounded on Wednesday and the numbers told the tale of losses - the Dow swooned 5.1 per cent, the S&P 500 6.1 per cent and Nasdaq 6.5 per cent - all talk of a re-testing of bottoms was silenced amid panicked shouts of 'Dow 6,000'.

'We are in free fall in both the economy and the markets. There is simply no way to measure or forecast a bottom from where we stand right now,' said Jim Awad, managing director at Zephyr Capital Management shortly before trading began yesterday morning on the New York Stock Exchange.