Financial woes ‘bigger than Wall Street’

BRIAN WILLIAMS, anchor: No one will blame you if you get dizzy watching the stock market this week. Stocks surged higher on Wall Street today. The Dow gaining 423 points, Nasdaq , S&P 500 also up more than 4 1/2 percent. But look at it this way, so far this week the Dow has been down 635 points, down 430, down 520, now up 423, which somehow brings us to CNBC 's Sue Herera . Sue , is this just the way it's going to be for a while for us?

SUE HERERA reporting: I hope not. Maybe for a little bit longer , Brian . But what we've seen this week so far is unprecedented. Never before in history has the Dow had four 400-point days, either to the upside or to the downside. I've never seen this kind of volatility. I really haven't.

WILLIAMS: All this -- all this talk about Congress , of course, reminds us what's at stake here is bigger than -- forgive the expression -- just Wall Street .

HERERA: It's absolutely bigger than Wall Street . It's a global problem. It's a debt problem over in Europe. It's the investor's perception that Washington is not serious about the debt here in the United States . And all of that has created an enormous amount of uncertainty, on Wall Street itself but also on Main Street . And that's not good if we're looking for an economic recovery.

WILLIAMS: And the head of the Fed seem to be saying pretty directly that the forecast looks like two down years ahead of us.

HERERA: It does, and that's why the Federal Reserve is going to keep interest rates low for the next two years. Wall Street liked that news initially, but now Wall Street is coming to grips with the fact that the reason the Fed's keeping interest rates low for two years is because the economic recovery has stalled, housing is not improving, the jobs numbers are not good. A lot of people are out of work. All of that is a combination that Wall Street right now is worried about.

WILLIAMS: Sue Herera , it's been great to have your wise counsel this week.

HERERA: Thank you, Brian .

WILLIAMS: Thank you. Always good to see you.