WhyItDropped

Nasdaq · March 13, 2020

The emergency declaration on the Nasdaq

+9.35%

single-day change vs previous close

Part of a longer stretch

The COVID crash on the Nasdaq

near the end of it · 2020-02-19 → 2020-03-23, -30.12% over the whole period

What happened that day?

  • On 13 March 2020 the Nasdaq rose 9.35% in a single day
  • That week alternated crashes and surges. Two days earlier the fall had been steep enough to halt trading
  • On this day the US declared a national emergency and said it would mobilise federal funds and powers
  • Plans for expanded testing and private-sector cooperation came with it, signalling a response had begun
  • The actual low, though, was ten days later on 23 March
  • In this stretch the Nasdaq would surge one day and give it all back the next. That is volatility, not direction

Sources

Every figure on this page is recomputed from the original daily closing prices and checked against them at build time. The account of what happened is written from the sources listed above.