It was a roller coaster ride on North American markets Wednesday after U.S. telecom giant WorldCom confirmed a US$3.8 billion accounting scandal. While U.S. markets managed to rally back, Toronto stocks suffered losses.

The S&P/TSX Composite Index fell 99.82 points to close at 7,020.98, with weakness in most sectors.

The information technology index fell 4.2%, and the telecommunications services index was off 2.4%.

WorldCom suppliers took major hits. Nortel closed at $2.20, down 30¢. JDS Uniphase was off 3¢ at $4.19.

Other tech stocks hit included Celestica, down 90¢ to $33.30, and ATI Technologies, down 45¢ to $9.75.

Financial stocks were weaker on worries over exposure to WorldCom’s US$30 billion US debt. The financial sub-index slipped 1.5%.

Royal Bank closed down $1.76 at $51.01, while Bank of Nova Scotia dropped $1.22 to $48.77

Sun Life Financial revealed it had US$45 million US in exposure to WorldCom.

TD Bank said it had no exposure to WorldCom. TD shares rose $1.25 to $34.50.

The TSX gold sector was down 1.7% . Placer Dome declined 60¢ at $18.50 after Australia’s AurionGold urged shareholders to delay accepting Placer Dome’s all-stock takeover bid.

Toronto volume was 250.6 million shares as decliners outpaced advancers 792 to 329 with 179 unchanged.

The TSX Venture Exchange was off 15.82 points to 1,168.45.

In New York, Stocks made an astounding comeback in the last hour of trading Wednesday’s, erasing huge losses which flowed from the WorldCom announcemnt.

The Dow Jones industrial average closed down six points, 0.1%, to 9,120, after trading as low as 8,926. The tech heavy Nasdaq — which went as low as 1,375 intraday — actually ended up five points to 1429. And the S&P 500 added two points to 973.

WorldCom’s news threatened to drown out the outcome of the Federal Open Market Committee’s two-day meeting. The FOMC, the Federal Reserve’s policymaking arm, said it would leave the fed funds target rate unchanged at 1.75%, as analysts had expected.

Shares of WorldCom traded in pre-market trading on Instinet as low as 9 cents US, down 74 cents US from its close at 4 p.m Tuesday. Trading in WorldCom shares was later halted after more than 13 million shares changed hands.

The Canadian dollar slipped 0.14¢ to US65.83¢.