The 2010 event in which the Dow Jones Industrial Average briefly plunged about 1,000 points was the Flash Crash.
On May 6, 2010, U.S. equity markets experienced an extremely rapid fall and partial rebound. The Dow lost about 1,000 points, or nearly 9 percent, during the session before recovering much of the decline. Some individual securities briefly traded at extraordinarily low prices.
Investigations linked the episode to a combination of market conditions, automated trading, and a large sell order. A later U.S. investigation charged trader Navinder Singh Sarao with using spoofing strategies that contributed to the volatility, although the broader event involved multiple interacting factors.
The Flash Crash differed from a conventional bear market because much of the movement occurred within minutes. Exchanges and regulators subsequently strengthened circuit breakers and market-wide controls to reduce the risk of similar disorder.