The stock market opened with little movement on the final day of 2020 as the world faces a challenging and uncertain 2021.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average, S&P 500 index and Nasdaq composite each opened Thursday within 0.1 percent of their Wednesday closing levels, remaining near new record highs set that day. The week in between Christmas and New Years Day is traditionally strong for the stock market.
Thursday’s unremarkable open kicked off the last day of tumultuous but incredibly successful year for stocks, which have set and shattered a series of new record highs throughout most of 2020.
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The onset of the coronavirus pandemic triggered a stock market crash in February and March that cost the major indexes roughly 20 percent of their value. But the quicker-than-expected beginning of the recovery from the coronavirus recession and steady progress toward highly effective COVID-19 vaccines helped the market make up all of its 2020 losses by mid-summer.
The strength of the stock market, however, stands in stark contrast to the pain and weakness seen throughout the U.S. economy. More than 10 million jobs lost to the coronavirus recession have not yet been replaced and nearly a third of Americans are struggling to pay for basic expenses, according to Census Bureau data.
Economists are generally optimistic that the U.S. will see the start of a major comeback by the middle of 2021, but say the recovery is highly dependent on how quickly the country can contain COVID-19 and vaccinate enough of its population.