Stocks got slammed in extremely light trading Thursday following the employment report, which revealed more weakness for job trends ahead of the long July 4 holiday weekend.

For June, nonfarm payrolls fell 467,000, much worse than the 358,000 job-loss figure that the markets were looking for, and the unemployment rate rose to 9.5% from 9.4%. Hourly earnings were unchanged. Action Economics said the report was weaker than expected due to a drop in the workweek to a new low of 33.0 hours from 33.1 over the last three months, and an associated big 0.8% drop in the hours-worked index. The mix left a hefty 7.9% rate of decline for hours-worked in the second quarter overall that followed prior contraction rates of 8.9% in the first quarter and 7.4% in the fourth quarter. Action Economics said it has revised down its second quarter GDP estimate to a decline of 2.5% from a drop of 2.0%.

In the weekly update, initial jobless claims fell 16,000 to 614,000, while continuing claims fell 53,00 to 6,702,000. U.S. Factory Orders jumped 1.2% in May from a revised 0.5% increase in April [previously 0.7%] and better than the 0.8% that markets expected.

Trading on the New York Stock Exchange remained open beyond the usual 4 p.m. ET market close to 4:15 p.m. Thursday "in order to execute customer orders impacted by system irregularities," according to the NYSE. Larry Liebowitz, head of U.S. markets at the NYSE, said on CNBC that the exchange experienced a series of "network problems" that prevented communication of orders. He said trading hours were extended to make sure all disrupted orders could be completed.

On Thursday, the 30-stock Dow Jones industrial average finished the session down 223.32 points, or 2.63%, to 8,280.74. The broad Standard & Poor's 500-stock index declined 26.91 points, or 2.91%, to 896.42. The tech-heavy Nasdaq composite index lost 49.20 points, or 2.67%, to 1,796.52.

Treasuries moved higher in price, sending yields lower in the wake of the employment report and "reinsterted some fresh qualms about the recovery," said Action Economics. The 10-year note yield fell to 3.495%. Among other news, the European Central Bank left its key interest rate unchanged at 1% at today's policy meeting.

The dollar index was up 0.54 to 80.17 as a Japanese finance ministry official said the dollar remains the key currency, adding that it will keep investing most reserves in dollars. Also, China's Vice Foreign Minister says that the USD is the main global reserve currency, in comments reported on Reuters this session, with the minister stating that he has not heard of the China request for a reserve currency debate.