NEW YORK—U.S. stocks took off late Tuesday afternoon, gaining 889 points - or about 10 percentage points - for the whole day as bargain hunters bought stocks that were at record lows. The gain, which is the second biggest daily point gain in its history, pushed the Dow back up over 9,000 points to end at 9,065.12 at Tuesday’s close.
The final half-hour of trading produced a jump of almost 700 points, which marked the climax of what started off as a bargain-hunter expedition in the morning. On the New York Stock Exchange, volume trading hit 1.7 billion, with four times as many advancing stocks as declining.
The gain is the second-largest for the Dow since a record jump of 936 points on Oct. 13, when the U.S. government announced plans to buy stakes in banks.
The gains came one day ahead of the Federal Reserve’s expected decision on interest points, which is due on Wednesday. The United States central bank is widely expected to cut rates down to 1 percent, which would be the lowest rates since July 2004.
The dramatic rebound on Wall Street boosted markets around the world. Europe’s leading FTSE index and Japan’s Nikkei index had both posted a 2 percent gain as this article went to press.
The euphoric gains did pare down a little bit when the Conference Board released the consumer-confidence index which hit 38, down from around 61 in September 2008. The numbers reflect the lowest consumer confidence in 41 years, and was well below the reading of 51 that most analysts had expected.
The final half-hour of trading produced a jump of almost 700 points, which marked the climax of what started off as a bargain-hunter expedition in the morning. On the New York Stock Exchange, volume trading hit 1.7 billion, with four times as many advancing stocks as declining.
The gain is the second-largest for the Dow since a record jump of 936 points on Oct. 13, when the U.S. government announced plans to buy stakes in banks.
The gains came one day ahead of the Federal Reserve’s expected decision on interest points, which is due on Wednesday. The United States central bank is widely expected to cut rates down to 1 percent, which would be the lowest rates since July 2004.
The dramatic rebound on Wall Street boosted markets around the world. Europe’s leading FTSE index and Japan’s Nikkei index had both posted a 2 percent gain as this article went to press.
The euphoric gains did pare down a little bit when the Conference Board released the consumer-confidence index which hit 38, down from around 61 in September 2008. The numbers reflect the lowest consumer confidence in 41 years, and was well below the reading of 51 that most analysts had expected.
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