The Dow Has Lost Nearly 14% In A Volatile Month

By Avie Schneider

Published March 31, 2020 at 9:58 AM CDT

Trading ends for the day on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange on March 20. It was the last day before the exchange switched to all-electronic trading in an effort to help contain the spread of the coronavirus.

Updated at 4:07 p.m. ET

The stock market has never seen a month like March. The Dow notched losses and gains of 1,000 points to as many as 3,000 points in a day in reaction to the coronavirus pandemic and its economic toll.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average has recovered from recent lows, but it's still down nearly 14% this month.

And the blue chip index is 26% below its recent peak in February. At its low on March 23, it was down a staggering 38% from the record high.

On Tuesday, the Dow closed down 410 points, or 1.8%. The S&P 500 fell about 1.6%, and the Nasdaq inched down about 1%.

The stock market has whipsawed throughout the month, making unheard-of moves in just a matter of hours and days. The volatility triggered several automatic, temporary trading halts on the the New York Stock Exchange.

On March 16, the Dow lost a staggering 2,997 points — the most for a single day. That 13% drop was the steepest since the Black Monday crash of October 1987.

But the market saw dramatic ups, too.

The Dow soared 2,112 points March 24, breaking a single-day record that had been set just 11 days earlier on Friday the 13th. The index gained nearly 11.4% on March 24 — the most since 1933.