The Stock Market Crashes: Black Monday and Black Tuesday
The Dow drops nearly 13 percent, then almost 12 percent more, and loses half its value within weeks
Quick facts
- Black Monday
- October 28, 1929, Dow down nearly 13 percent
- Black Tuesday
- October 29, 1929, Dow down almost 12 percent
- Low point
- Dow 41.22, summer 1932, 89 percent below peak
- Recovery to old high
- November 1954
What happened
In September 1929 stock prices began to gyrate, and in October a group of bankers led by National City Bank president Charles Mitchell tried to prop up the market by publicly buying blocks of shares. The effort failed and investors began selling. On Black Monday, October 28, 1929, the Dow fell nearly 13 percent; the next day, Black Tuesday, it dropped almost another 12 percent. By mid-November the Dow had lost roughly half its value. The slide continued until the summer of 1932, when the Dow closed at 41.22, its lowest point of the twentieth century and 89 percent below its 1929 peak. The Dow did not return to its pre-crash high until November 1954.
Why it matters
The crash wiped out the savings of many investors and frightened consumers and businesses alike. Fear cut spending on big-ticket goods bought on credit, so firms like Ford slowed production and laid off workers. The stock market collapse did not by itself cause the Depression, but it marked the end of the boom and helped turn the downturn that began in the summer of 1929 into a deepening contraction.
How we know
The daily index moves are recorded in Federal Reserve economic data and reconstructed in the Federal Reserve History account of the crash, which draws on Federal Reserve Board minutes and the correspondence of reserve bank leaders.
Sources
- Federal Reserve History (Gary Richardson, Alejandro Komai, Michael Gou, and Daniel Park). Stock Market Crash of 1929 · Reputable sourcefederalreservehistory.org · The domain "federalreservehistory.org" is on our Reputable source registry. · Link is live and its text matches the event's key terms (Jul 2026)
- Federal Reserve History (Gary Richardson). The Great Depression · Reputable sourcefederalreservehistory.org · The domain "federalreservehistory.org" is on our Reputable source registry. · Link is live and its text matches the event's key terms (Jul 2026)
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Part of a timelineThe Great Depression20 events · The longest and deepest downturn in the history of the modern industrial economy, from a stock market that lost 89 percent of its value to breadlines that ran for a decadeView all →