Stocks Recover From Early Bloodbath, Dow Down 1% -- U.S. Commentary

(RTTNews) - U.S. stocks have staged a dramatic recovery Monday afternoon, as bargain hunters swooped in after staggering losses earlier in the session.

On one of the more volatile session in recent market history, the Dow Jones Industrial Average plunged about 1,000 points at the opening bell, only to claw back to within 150 points of the unchanged line by noon.

A number of major stocks have even turned positive, including Disney, CBS and Apple.

In a sign that investors are looking for quality stocks, few blue-chips are showing declines of more than 2 percent.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 178 points, or 1 percent, at 16,282.

Apple led a recovery in tech shares, leaving the Nasdaq down 0.7 percent at 4,674.

Crude oil has snapped back above $39 after briefly falling below $38 to its lowest in six years.

A rout in Chinese stocks and concerns about a Federal Reserve rate hike sparked this morning's initial weakness.

Chinese shares plunged more than 8 percent overnight, sending European shares to their worst daily performance in years.

However, the market tantrums and concerns about the health of the global economy will convince the Fed push out interest rate hikes into next year, possibly as late as March, according the analysts at Barclays.