Market Meltdown: Is It Black Friday?

Oct. 10, 2008 — -- Is today Black Friday?

In its opening minutes, the Dow Jones industrial average fell nearly 700 points, dipping below 8,000 for the first time since March 2003. But then the market reversed, turning positive just for a few minutes after 10 a.m. It then hovered just above and below that mark in the first hour of trading. By 11:30 though, the Dow was back down nearly 400 points.

Things didn't improve as the day went on. By 2 p.m., the Dow had once again fallen below 8,000, down more than 550 points. But the end of the day, things turned positive with stocks up more than 200 points by 3:30 p.m. But in the end, the gains didn't hold with the Dow losing more than 100 points.

Global markets remain inconsolable with markets in Asia closing sharply down and European markets trading significantly lower. Markets around the world appear to be caught in a slow-moving crash, which could pick up speed today as investors call their brokers looking for a way out of the free fall.

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The momentum here is for a continued sell-off. The VIX -- an index that shows fear in the markets -- ticked to its all-time high at the end of the trading day Thursday, signaling continued turbulence in the U.S. markets.

Thursday's anniversary of the stock market peak turned into one of the worst days in Wall Street history, with the Dow Jones industrials losing a breathtaking 679 points. A year to the day after its highest close ever the Dow closed down nearly 40 percent since that record.