During the 2010 Flash Crash, how many Dow Jones Industrial Average points did the index briefly lose?

During the 2010 Flash Crash, the Dow Jones Industrial Average briefly lost nearly 1,000 points.

On May 6, 2010, major U.S. stock indexes fell rapidly within minutes before recovering much of the decline. The Dow’s intraday fall was about 998.5 points, or roughly 9 percent, making the episode one of the fastest major market disruptions in modern history.

Investigations found that automated trading and a large sell order interacted with thin market liquidity. High-frequency traders reduced activity or sold, while prices of some individual securities moved to extreme levels. The event demonstrated that electronic markets could transmit shocks at extraordinary speed.

The crash was not a conventional multi-month bear market like 1929 or 2008. It was a short-lived market dislocation, and many prices recovered before the trading session ended. Regulators later introduced or strengthened safeguards, including circuit breakers and rules intended to limit disorderly trading in individual shares and the broader market.