10 craziest days on Wall Street in 2008: #6 Consumer confidence hits all-time low ... let's buy stocks!

Posted Jan 3rd 2009 4:30PM by Greg Tucker
Filed under: Boeing Co (BA), BP p.l.c. ADS (BP), U.S. Steel (X), Valero Energy (VLO), Recession

Oct. 28: Dow 9,065 (up 889 points); trading range, 958 points

Try to figure this one out:

Consumer confidence reaches the lowest levels on record since the survey began 41 years ago ...

Home prices in 20 major metro areas fall 16% year-over-year and have been falling for 20 consecutive months ...

And the market rallies to post its second-largest gain of the year.

Huh?!?

The volatile session ended with the benchmark index almost 900 points higher as bargain hunting and short-covering ruled the day, with some help from strength in the overseas markets.

A labor agreement at Boeing (NYSE: BA), and better-than-expected earnings at U.S. Steel (NYSE: X) and energy sector names Occidental Petroleum (NYSE: OXY), Valero Energy (NYSE: VLO) and BP (NYSE: BP) also added fuel to the market's fire (pun intended).

Greg Tucker is the executive editor of OptionsZone.com.

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