The first major selling wave of the 1929 Wall Street Crash, known as Black Thursday, occurred on October 24, 1929.
Panic selling began on the New York Stock Exchange after a period of heavy speculation and rapidly rising share prices. Trading volume surged, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell sharply, although a group of prominent bankers helped stabilize prices temporarily by buying selected shares.
The apparent recovery did not last. Selling intensified on the following Monday and reached an even more famous climax on Black Tuesday, October 29. The crash was not caused by one isolated event: excessive margin buying, overvalued shares, weakening economic conditions, and declining industrial activity all contributed.
Black Thursday is sometimes confused with Black Tuesday because October 29 produced the largest trading-volume day of the episode. The 1929 crash helped usher in the Great Depression, although the relationship between the market collapse and the broader economic downturn was complex.