A Black Friday for Stocks

The financial sector was among the hardest hit. The NYSE Financial Sector Index dropped 2.7%, the Nasdaq Financial 100 Index slumped 2.6%, and the KBW Bank Index lost 2.4%.

"Financial name after financial name has given us a stacking effect with worse-than-expected results," said Steven Sheldon, principal with SMS Capital Management. "Seeing this, there is a fear and likelihood that the rest of businesses will start to slow. If these financials are having massive writedowns, then you have to question how this affects the entire economy."

Crude oil, which has set a series of new record highs in recent days, slid 87 cents to close at $88.60 a barrel. Still, it gained nearly 6% this week.

Last time out, record crude prices coupled with miserable earnings from Bank of America (BAC Quote) and Washington Mutual (WM Quote) to pressure stocks. The Dow finished down 3.58 points to 13,888.96, and the S&P was off 1.16 points to 1540.08.

The Nasdaq gained 6.64 points, or 0.24%, to 2799.31.

Tech stocks were unable to carry over that momentum even with Google (GOOG Quote), which delivered a third-quarter earnings report after the close that beat both top- and bottom-line estimates. Shares advanced $5.09, or 0.8%, at $644.71.

Also after the previous session, chipmakers Xilinx (XLNX Quote) and SanDisk (SNDK Quote) exceeded estimates on an earnings-per-share basis. Advanced Micro Devices (AMD Quote) posted a big loss.