Dow, but Not Out: Massive Losses Avoided on Wall Street

Oct. 24, 2008 — -- What started out as a catastrophy on Wall Street ended as just another in a series of bad days for investors with the Dow Jones Industrial Average closing down 312 points.

Just a few months ago such a large drop would have been seen a miserable day. Today, investors were close to cheering.

The day started off with a massive drop in stock futures after a sell-off overseas, triggered by fears of a deep and prolonged global recession. The drop was large enough to trigger a trading halt but that halt appears to have helped Wall Street to avoid a market meltdown today.

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Within minutes of the 9:30 a.m. market open, the Dow fell 500 points. But after hitting a low of -501.46 points at 9:35 a.m., the index stabilized, staying down most of the morning. Throughout the day it slowly climbed, fell and climbed again. By 3:01 p.m., the Dow was only down 106.81 points before dropping down again. It never turned positive.

The Dow closed down about 315 points, or 3.25 percent. It was a bad day but nowhere near the catastrophe many were expecting at the start of the day.

The S&P 500 lost 3.5 percent and the Nasdaq lost 3.2 percent.

For the week, the biggest loser was the Nasdaq shedding 9.3 percent, compared to 6.8 percent for the S&P and 5.4 percent for the Dow.

For the month, the Dow is down 22.8 percent so far, the S&P is down 24.7 percent and the Nasdaq is down 25.8 percent.