Stocks tumbled today, as a new wave of jitters over financial companies swept through the market.

The Standard & Poor's 500 index fell 2.9 percent, to 1,475.62, its steepest decline since August. The Dow fell 2.6 percent and the Nasdaq composite index declined 2.7 percent.  Stocks have now given up all the gains that came after the Federal Reserve surprised investors with a half-point cut in rates on September 17.

Stocks were also pressured by a slump in the dollar and a surge in oil prices.

But financial stocks led the downturn.  Shares of Washington Mutual declined 17 percent.  The bank said it expected its loan losses to mount. And an investigation by the New York attorney general into Washington Mutual's mortgages stepped up with subpoenas to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Comments from a Federal Reserve official also weighed on stocks.

In a speech on "market healing"  at  Marquette University in Milwaukee, Willliam Poole, the president of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, said that "barring unusual circumstances, the F.O.M.C. would not consider a rate increase just after cutting its fed funds rate target."

Shares of General Motors tumbled nearly 4 percent after G.M. announced a greater than expected loss and a $39 billion charge for the third quarter. Continued fallout from the subprime crisis weighed on financial stocks as well.

The price of oil continued its flirtation with the psychologically significant $100 level, but it appeared to have stalled after the Energy Department that inventories dropped less than economists had expected last week. A barrel of oil clocked in at $97.60 on the New York Mercantile Exchange this morning after earlier reaching $98.62.

The price of gold also continued its climb upward on the Nymex, up $16.10 to $839.50 an ounce, inching closer to the all-time high it reached in 1980.

The U.S. dollar fell to new lows against the euro and Canadian dollar after China hinted that it may diversify its $1.4 trillion in currency reserves.

The Labor Department offered a bit of good news, announcing that worker productivity rose 4.9 percent in the last quarter, which is its fastest pace in four years, but it wasn't enough to offset the otherwise negative mood on Wall Street.