Stocks plunged in New York yesterday, with selling picking up in the final minutes of trading as the Dow industrials tumbled 299.43 points in the third-biggest point loss ever.

The Dow Jones industrial average closed at 8,487.31, in a sell-off that brought its losses to 9.1 per cent, or 850.66 points, from the record 9,337.97 of July 17th.

The 299-point drop in heavy trading was a fall of 3.4 per cent. Only the 554.26-point loss of October 27th, 1997 and the 508.00point fall of October 19th, 1987 were bigger.

The accelerating slide yesterday, extending big losses of the past two-and-a-half weeks, raised questions about the staying power of a bull market that had seen the Dow nearly quadruple since October 1990.

While Wall Street's best-known indicator still is up 7.3 per cent so far this year, that is less than half of the 18.1 per cent gain it had compiled when it peaked last month.