Wall street closing low

U.S. stocks sank more than 1 percent Wednesday after the Federal Reserve (Fed) announced plans to further reduce its monthly bond buying program. In U.S. economic news, the Fed’s decision was not a surprise, but some investors had expected the central bank to address the recent turmoil in Turkey and other emerging markets that have spilled over to Wall Street. In international economic news, the Turkish lira fell further despite an emergency interest rate cut Tuesday. Investors have been rattled in recent weeks by what some are now calling the Fragile Five of developing markets: Turkey, India, Brazil, Indonesia, and South Africa. In addition to Turkey, India and South Africa have raised rates this week to stabilize shaky currencies. The Argentinian peso has been in free fall since after a move by Argentina’s government to devalue the currency last week. China has also been a source of concern since a report on manufacturing activity came in weaker than expected last week. The dollar lost ground against the pound, but gained ground versus the euro and the yen. Light sweet crude oil for March delivery dropped 5 cents to $97.36 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Gold futures moved up $11.40 to $1,262.20 an ounce. The Dow Jones industrial average fell 189.77, or 1.19 percent, to 15,738.79. The broader Standard & Poor’s 500 index lost 18.3, or 1.02 percent, to 1,774.20. The technology-heavy Nasdaq composite index dropped 46.53, or 1.14 percent, to 4,051.43.