What 1973–1974 event marked a major global stock-market crash after the oil shock?

The 1973–1974 stock-market crash was a major global decline that followed the 1973 oil shock.

The crash began amid high inflation, slowing economic growth, and the collapse of the postwar Bretton Woods monetary arrangements. The October 1973 oil embargo by Arab members of OPEC sharply increased energy prices, adding to inflation and economic uncertainty after the Yom Kippur War.

In the United States, the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell about 45% from its January 1973 peak to its December 1974 low. The bear market affected the United States, Britain, and other major economies. It was part of a wider period often described as stagflation, combining weak growth with rising prices.

The episode is sometimes reduced to the oil shock alone, but monetary policy, currency instability, inflation, and recession all mattered. It also helped end the long postwar equity boom that had preceded the downturn.