Which U.S. stock-market crash in 1929 is associated with the phrase “Black Thursday”?

The phrase “Black Thursday” is associated with the Wall Street Crash of 1929.

Black Thursday refers to October 24, 1929, when heavy selling caused the Dow Jones Industrial Average to fall 11% at the opening. A late-day recovery followed after major bankers reportedly bought shares to support prices, but the intervention did not end the crisis. Selling returned the following week.

Black Monday came on October 28, and Black Tuesday followed on October 29. Together, those sessions made the crash a defining financial event of the twentieth century. The collapse ended the long speculative advance of the 1920s and contributed to a sharp destruction of household and institutional wealth.

The crash was an important catalyst for the Great Depression, but historians do not treat it as its only cause. Banking failures, monetary contraction, international debt problems, declining demand, and policy mistakes also played major roles. “Black Thursday” is therefore a nickname for a key day within the broader 1929 crash, not a separate crisis.