The wildest week in Wall Street history ended with a second day of gains.
The Dow Jones industrial average finished yesterday with a gain of 125 points. Most other times it would have been a fairly big day. By this week’s standards, it was a yawner.
Yesterday capped a week when the blue-chip index had four 400-point swings in a row for the first time in its 115-year history.
Trading was frantic across financial markets all week. The yield on the 10-year Treasury note hit a record low. Gold briefly topped $1,800 per ounce. Nearly every one of the 500 stocks that make up the Standard & Poor’s 500 index ended down midweek.
“It was a sharp and violent week in the stock market, but it’s my sense that the worst is over,” said Michael Kaufler, a portfolio manager at Federated Investors.
Investors reacted to every scrap of news and each whispered rumor.
A rebound in retail sales in July pushed the stock market higher yesterday as traders looked past a Reuters/University of Michigan survey that found that consumers were pessimistic about their finances and the economy. The measure of consumer sentiment fell to a 30-year low.
The Dow finished yesterday with a gain of 125.71 points, or 1.1 percent, to 11,269.02. It finished the week down 1.5 percent after being down as much as 6.3 percent for the week.
The broader S&P 500 index rose 6.17 points, or 0.5 percent, to 1,178.81. It finished the week down 1.7 percent. The technology-focused Nasdaq composite rose 15.30, or 0.6 percent, to 2,507.98. It lost 1 percent for the week. All three major stock indexes are now down more than 10 percent from their April highs.