Jittery stock market takes big loss

The 265-point loss on the Dow was the biggest one-day drop since last November. Stocks were down sharply all day (big drops in the price of gold and other commodities, propelled by worse-than-expected data from China), but the decline worsened in the last hour on news of the bomb blasts in Boston. The Dow closed at 14,599. As for gold, the WSJ explains:

The collapse of gold is provoking a chorus of "I told you so" from those long skeptical that the rise in the metal's price was a harbinger of inflation. The recent drop in gold prices coincides with weakness in the prices of other commodities. That is seen by some as a signal the world economy--and China's, in particular--may be slowing. Prices of energy, metals and other commodities are exquisitely sensitive to changes in demand, and thus are an important gauge of the pace of industrial activity around the world. Commodity prices fell sharply during the recession, rebounded for time, peaked in the spring of 2011, fell for about a year, and then turned up again in mid-2012.