U.S. stocks claw back half of ground lost after U.K. vote
Banks and other financial companies led another broad surge in U.S. stocks on Wednesday, turning the Dow Jones industrial average and the Standard & Poor’s 500 index slightly positive for the year.
It was the second rally in two days for the stock market, which had been rattled since Friday by investor concerns over Britain’s vote to leave the European Union.
The market also got a boost from new data on consumer spending.
The EU worries eased Wednesday as traders shifted money back into stocks.
The gains over Tuesday and Wednesday erased more than half of the losses U.S. markets suffered in the two-day slide that kicked off on Friday.
Britain’s stock market has recouped all its losses in the same stretch, but other major markets in Europe and Asia have yet to bounce back fully.
European stock indexes posted gains that eclipsed Wall Street’s for the second day in a row. The British pound edged up against the dollar following its plunge to 31-year lows after the British vote last week.
Also Wednesday, the U.S. Commerce Department said that consumer spending increased 0.4 percent in May on top of a 1.1 percent surge in April.
The data underscore the fact that consumer spending, which accounts for about 70 percent of U.S. economic activity, picked up in the spring after getting off to a slow start in 2016.