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U.S. stocks plunged Friday, erasing the week's gains, as rising fears about fallout from Europe's debt crisis overshadowed President Barack Obama's plan to revive the U.S. job market.

A top board member of the European Central Bank unexpectedly resigned on Friday in what analysts saw as further evidence of the deep divisions over how to resolve Europe’s growing debt crisis. The move immediately rattled European markets and the euro, which slipped to a six-month low against the dollar. The European Stoxx and German DAX indexes tumbled 3.5 percent.

Markets declined on Friday in the wake of President Obama’s jobs speech that added to the uncertainty already weighing on global markets over the euro zone.

Nasdaq OMX has stepped up its opposition to the planned merger between NYSE Euronext and Deutsche Börse and said the deal would "irrevocably destroy" competition in Europe's listed-derivatives markets, just as the European Commission nears a decision on the tie-up.

Groupon is going to wait at least a couple of weeks before launching the final phase of its initial public offering because regulators still have questions for the daily deals website and the stock market is too volatile, a person familiar with the situation said on Tuesday.

JPMorgan Chase & Co, the second largest U.S. bank by assets, led a broader decline in bank share prices, as investors feared lenders face a growing list of lawsuits due to problem mortgages.

Crude-oil futures continued Friday's slide on growing fears that the U.S. is heading back into recession.

Stocks are rising after Tropical Storm Irene wound up being less severe than many analysts had anticipated.

Several European countries that banned short-selling have extended the prohibition until the end of September. When concerns about European banks’ exposure to Greek debt sent their stocks plummeting two weeks ago, market regulators in Belgium, France, Greece, Italy and Spain stepped in to prohibit traders from betting on the decline in a share’s price.

The Dow Jones industrial average is closing with its biggest gain in nearly two weeks.