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Dow finishes wild week on an up note
DANIEL WAGNER
(The Associated Press)



07:43:26AM (DST) Saturday,August 15,2011.

NEW YORK (AP) — The wildest week on Wall Street since the financial crisis in 2008 ended with a second day of gains.

The Dow Jones industrial average finished Friday with a gain of 125 points. Most other times it would have been a fairly big day. By this week's standards, it was a sleeper. Friday capped a week when the blue-chip index had four 400-point swings in a row for the first time in its 115-year history.

Trading was frantic across financial markets all week. The yield on the 10-year Treasury note hit a record low. Gold briefly topped $1,800 per ounce.

Investors reacted to every scrap of news and each whispered rumor. A credit downgrade for the United States. Concerns about European bank solvency. Fears of a possible new recession in the U.S. Word that the Federal Reserve would keep interest rates low for two more years because of slowing growth. A positive retail sales report. Strong earnings from a technology bellwether. Better unemployment news.

The Dow dropped 634 points Monday, its sixth-worst point drop, as investors responded to Standard & Poor's withdrawal of the country's AAA credit rating. It was the first downgrade of U.S. government debt in history. The Dow rose 429 points Tuesday, only to plunge 519 points Wednesday. It surged 423 points on Thursday following a better-than-expected drop in applications for unemployment benefits.

A rebound in retail sales in July pushed the stock market higher Friday as traders looked past a Reuters/University of Michigan survey that found that consumers were pessimistic about their own finances and the economy. The measure of consumer sentiment fell to a 30-year low.

It was the first time since early July that the Dow and S&P index rose for two consecutive days.

The Dow finished Friday with a gain of 125.71 points, or 1.1 percent, to 11,269.02. It finished the week down 1.5 percent after being down as much as 6.3 percent.

The broader S&P 500 index rose 6.17 points, or 0.5 percent, to 1,178.81. It finished the week down 1.7 percent. The technology-focused Nasdaq composite rose 15.30, or 0.6 percent, to 2,507.98. It lost 1 percent for the week.

The yield on the 10-year Treasury note fell to 2.26 percent from 2.34 percent late Thursday. It had fallen to a record low of 2.03 percent earlier in the week.

Two stocks rose for every one that fell on the New York Stock Exchange. Volume was above average at 5 billion shares, but lighter than earlier in the week when it reached 9.7 billion shares, the fourth-highest on record.

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NYSE sustained bruises that can be healed.

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