By Caitlin McCabe and Jack Pitcher

A Friday surge brightened what had been a gloomy week on Wall Street, with bargain hunters pushing the Dow industrials within reach of the 50000-point threshold.

The blue-chip average soared about 2%, or 950 points, to an intraday record above 49900. Big gainers in the Dow included Nvidia, 3M, Caterpillar and Goldman Sachs.

Investments from tech stocks to cryptocurrencies bounced back from losses earlier in the week. The Nasdaq composite was up about 1.7% after dropping 4.5% in the past three sessions, reflecting investor concerns both about artificial-intelligence disruption and potential overinvestment. Bitcoin rose 10%, retaking much of Thursday's losses to trade near $70,000.

Investors credited a resilient economy and healthy corporate earnings with fueling the gains, saying the slump of recent days had gone beyond the economic fundamentals.

"Emotional deleveraging selloffs such as this week are unnerving," said Mark Hackett, chief market strategist at Nationwide. But "at this point, the macro and earnings environment remain encouraging," he added.

Amazon stock bucked the upbeat trend, showing investors remain wary of outsize AI-related spending plans. Jeep maker Stellantis tumbled after saying it will take a $26 billion hit to scale back in electric vehicles.

A preliminary readout from the University of Michigan showed consumer sentiment at the highest since August, and short-term inflation expectations moderating to 3.5%, the lowest level in just over a year.

This item is part of a Wall Street Journal live coverage event. The full stream can be found by searching P/WSJL (WSJ Live Coverage).

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

February 06, 2026 12:34 ET (17:34 GMT)

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