Wednesday Evening Business Brief

• Stocks suffered their worst one-day loss of the year. The Dow dropped 313 points, or 2.4 percent, to 12,933. The S&P declined 34 points, while the Nasdaq declined 75 points.
• First Sandy, now snow. Major airlines have canceled flights in and out of the New York area as the region contends with the second significant storm in little more than a week. Superstorm Sandy caused more than 20,000 flight cancellations, making it the second-most disruptive storm in the last seven years.
• Apple's stock is now in bear market territory having dropped more than 20 percent from its record high in September. Even so, Apple still enjoys the largest market capitalization of any publicly-traded company, still well ahead of no. 2 ExxonMobil.
• The price of oil dropped nearly 5 percent today. Benchmark crude declined more than $4 to settle at $84.44.
• The Federal Reserve says Americans took out more student and auto loans in September. The result was that consumer borrowing jumped to a record level. But they cut back on credit card borrowing, a sign many remain cautious about taking on high-interest debt.

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