Shares of General Electric Co. plunged in very active trade Wednesday, putting them on track for the biggest selloff nine years, with losses accelerating after Chief Executive John Flannery started talking at an industry conference.

The industrial conglomerate’s stock GE, -2.24% closed down 7.3%, enough to pace the Dow Jones Industrial Average’s DJIA, -1.92% losers. Volume ballooned to 147.3 million shares, well more than double the full-day average of 61.0 million shares, to make the stock the most actively traded on major U.S. exchanges.

The stock suffered the biggest one-day percentage decline since it plummeted 8.4% on April 20, 2009. It was down only about 2% at 11:30 a.m. ET Wednesday, which was just before Flannery started speaking at the Electrical Products Group conference in Florida.

When Flannery was asked why he thought the stock sold off after he started talking, he suggested it had something to do with investor disappointment over how “deliberate” the company was moving to right the ship, according to a transcript of his speech provided by FactSet.

FactSet, MarketWatch

He said many people seemed to wonder “what’s taking so long?” with the turnaround plan, and why aren’t things moving faster. Flannery explained that GE was a “huge company” with a “long arc of history,” so he owed it to the company and its investors to act in a “very deliberate” and “thoughtful” way.

“So being deliberate and then moving when things make sense as opposed to moving just because somebody wants us to, it’s just my style,” Flannery said, according to FactSet. He said while that might not endear himself to everyone, “I’m highly confident we will make the decisions with the portfolio as and when [they] unfold, that will be a good decision for the portfolio.”

What may also be worrying investors, however, is that when Flannery was asked whether he could “stand behind” the current annual dividend rate of 48 cents a share, he was less than definitive.

The CEO said that while he was aware of how important the dividend was for investors, “it’s ultimately a function of the free cash flow of the company and that’s ultimately a function of our operating performance with the assets and things that we do with the portfolio.”

In other words, he didn’t simply say, “Yes.”

At current share prices, the dividend yield is 3.39%, compared with the implied yield for the Dow at 2.13%, according to FactSet.

Flannery also said in his prepared remarks that while the 2018 guidance range is unchanged, pressure in the power business means he expects results to be at the lower end of the range. He expects a “soft end market” for power, with conditions continuing into 2019 and 2020.

The investor disappointment comes after the stock closed Tuesday at a 3 1/2-month high, and flirted with an entry to a new bull market. On Monday, GE announced a deal to merge its transportation unit with Wabtec Corp. WAB, -2.97%