Oil Plunges Over 5% For Largest Daily Loss In 13 Months

Oil prices settled Wednesday at their lowest level of the year, suffering from their biggest one-day percentage drop since February 2016. U.S. government data showed that domestic-crude supplies jumped 8.2 million to 528.4 million barrels--the highest level on record. April West Texas Intermediate crude lost $2.86, or 5.4%, to settle $50.28 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange, the lowest finish for a front-month contract since early December. The sharp drop in crude futures was putting pressure on the Dow Jones Industrial Average and the S&P 500 index , with the energy sector posting the steepest decline of the broad-market benchmark's 11 sectors.