Falling oil prices cause Dow Jones to stumble 500 points

(Image credit: Brent Crude Oil Spot Price/FindTheData)

Oil prices nosedived on Friday, sending U.S. stocks tumbling. The Dow Jones industrial average briefly dropped more than 500 points before a slight recovery Friday afternoon, and the Standard & Poor's 500 Index dropped 2.7 percent to its lowest level since October 2014.

While oil prices had rallied on Thursday, traders bracing for the resumption of Iranian oil shipments drove crude oil prices to $29.28 a barrel — a 12-year low.

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"Markets have to go through several stages and right now they're just holding their head and crying," chief investment officer at Oppenheimer Funds Inc. Krishna Memani told Bloomberg.

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Jeva Lange was the executive editor at TheWeek.com. She formerly served as The Week's deputy editor and culture critic. She is also a contributor to Screen Slate, and her writing has appeared in The New York Daily News, The Awl, Vice, and Gothamist, among other publications. Jeva lives in New York City. Follow her on Twitter.