The wild ride isn’t over on Wall Street — and this time the big move is up.
Investors were as hungry to buy on Tuesday as they were desperate to sell the day before. In the biggest rally of the year on Wall Street, the Dow Jones industrial average shot up 400 points, or about 2.5 percent, to 16,271.
Why There Could Be More Chaos on Wall Street
China relieved investors by stepping in overnight to cut interest rates and prop up the world’s second-largest economy. Worries about economic growth in China have driven days of chaotic selling in stock markets around the world.
On TODAY, CNBC’s Jim Cramer cautioned: “No one ever made a dime panicking.”
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On Monday, the Dow nose-dived almost 1,100 points in the first six minutes, the most dramatic point drop ever in a trading day. It roared almost all the way back — then sank again. It finished down 588 points, or 3.6 percent.
Asian markets plunged again on Tuesday. The main stock index in Shanghai fell more than 7 percent and has now lost more than 40 percent of its value in a two-month crash. Stocks in Japan lost 4 percent.
But markets in Europe boomeranged higher. Stocks were up 3 percent in London, 4 percent in Frankfurt and 4 percent in Paris.
The U.S. Federal Reserve has been hinting that it wants to raise interest rates for the first time in almost a decade, but investors are wondering whether the market turmoil might lead the central bank to put those plans on hold.
“The Federal Reserve was remarkably silent yesterday,” Cramer said. “Hardly reassuring. Which is, again, why I don’t think the selling is necessary over. Although you’re getting a very good day, at least at the open.”