March 13 (UPI) — U.S. stocks saw a rally early Friday as the Dow Jones Industrial Average opened 6 percent higher and the S&P 500 climbed 5.7 percent.
The jump followed a trend in other financial markets around the globe that showed improvement after a brutal Thursday that saw massive losses across the board.
The S&P/ASX 200 in Australia rose 4.42 percent to 5,539.30 after falling 8 percent earlier. India’s Nifty 50 improved 2.15 percent.
London’s FTSE 100 rose 7 percent, France’s CAC 40 jumped 6 percent and Germany’s DAX improved 6 percent. Italy’s FTSE MIB improved 17 percent, making up for the 16.9 percent it lost on Thursday, but was still 26 percent off from the start of 2020.
Before the opening bell in the United States, S&P 500 Futures had bounced up 5 percent while oil prices improved 7 percent to $35.50 per barrel after a string of losses this week.
Not all things were rosy in the global stock market. South Korean stocks fell 3.4 percent Friday while the Hong Kong market tumbled 1.1 percent. The Shanghai and Shenzhen markets saw more than a 1 percent drop even though the Chinese government sets loss limits there.
Central banks around the world got involved this week during the current coronavirus-sparked financial crisis. The Bank of England and Norway’s central bank cut rates. Sweden’s Riksbank opened a $51 billion lending for its local banks. Australia’s Reserve Bank added $5.5 billion to the lending market there while the People’s Bank of China cut its reserve requirement ratio.
