Which 1973–1974 bear market cut the Dow Jones Industrial Average by about 45 percent?

The 1973–1974 bear market that cut the Dow Jones Industrial Average by about 45 percent was the 1973–1974 stock market crash.

The decline lasted from January 1973 until December 1974 and was one of the worst postwar bear markets in the United States and the United Kingdom. The Dow peaked on 11 January 1973 and reached its low on 6 December 1974, losing roughly 45 percent between those dates.

Several pressures overlapped: the 1973 oil crisis, high inflation, recession, the collapse of the Bretton Woods monetary system, and political uncertainty surrounding the Watergate scandal. The market’s fall was international, although its timing and severity differed across exchanges. It is sometimes confused with the 1970s energy crisis itself, but the oil shock was only one factor in the broader financial and economic downturn.