Dow survives early losses to close up 260 points

NEW YORK (UPI) — The Dow Jones ended with a second consecutive day of gains after a roller coaster session that saw it drop more than 600 points Thursday. At its lowest point of the day, the Dow Jones was down 611 points, before rallying back to close up 260.37, or 1.14 percent, to 23,138.82 at the end of trading. The S&P 500 fell as much as 2.8 percent, while the Nasdaq dropped 3.3 percent, but each closed the day up 0.86 percent and 0.38 percent respectively. Early drops in the market came amid reports President Donald Trump is considering a ban on U.S. companies using equipment by Chinese firms Huawei and ZTE. Thursday’s turbulent trading came after large fluctuations in the market earlier in the week as the Dow plummeted 653 points in its worst Christmas Eve ever, but bounced back 1,086 points in its largest single-day increase in history on Wednesday. Some stocks that led to Wednesday’s historic increase also contributed to Thursday’s up and down session. Tech stocks including Amazon, Facebook, Alphabet, Netflix and Apple all fell between 2 percent and 5 percent, while oil was down 2.8 percent Thursday after rising 9 percent Wednesday. GE was also down 5.7 percent Thursday after having its fifth best day of trading of the year on Wednesday. Reporting by Daniel Uria