A late-afternoon surge enabled the Dow to finish almost 2,000 points higher, or 9.4%, at 23,185.62, nearly reversing the losses from Thursday, when the blue-chip index suffered its worst session since 1987.
He described it as a"tragic milestone", and warned that it was impossible to say when the virus would peak globally. "In mere weeks, the market has shifted gears from a transitory health scare to a full-blown global recession," said AxiCorp market strategist Stephen Innes. That set the stage for Friday's bounce, but the gains in Europe did not approach the losses of the prior day.London, Frankfurt and Paris, which all posted double digit losses on Thursday, were up over seven percent at one point.Markets have wiped trillions of dollars off the globe's combined company valuations in just a few weeks.
Art Hogan, chief market strategist at National Securities, said Trump's announcement met expectations as far as laying out a health care response to the crisis.