The energy sector took a broad beating in afternoon trading Tuesday, as crude oil and natural gas prices took sharp dives on the back of a surge in the U.S. dollar and continued fears that a recession would dampen demand. The SPDR Energy Select Sector ETF /zigman2/quotes/206420077/composite XLE +0.44% tumbled 5.8% toward a more than four-month low, with all 21 of the equity components losing ground by more than 4%. The biggest decliners were shares of Halliburton Co. /zigman2/quotes/210488727/composite HAL +0.07% , which slumped 9.0%, and APA Corp. /zigman2/quotes/200648444/composite APA +1.56% , which dropped 8.5%. Among the more-active components, Exxon Mobil Corp.'s stock /zigman2/quotes/204455864/composite XOM +0.79% slid 5.0% toward the lowest close since mid-April, even after the company said late Friday that it would get a boost of at least $2.5 billion to second-quarter profit from rising oil and gas prices. Elsewhere, shares of Occidental Petroleum Corp. /zigman2/quotes/207018272/composite OXY +0.50% were knocked down 5.1% and Marathon Oil Corp. /zigman2/quotes/205031829/composite MRO +1.44% took a 7.9% hit. The best performer in the ETF was Chevron's stock /zigman2/quotes/205871374/composite CVX 0.00% , which fell 4.3%. Meanwhile, continuous crude oil futures /zigman2/quotes/209723049/delayed CL00 +1.26% dove 9.4% and natural gas futures /zigman2/quotes/210189548/delayed NG00 +5.44% sank 5.8%, while the S&P 500 /zigman2/quotes/210599714/realtime SPX +1.97% lost 0.9%.

















