Here’s what history says about Black Friday stock market performance

Rather than narrowing down deals, the day after Thanksgiving offers a limited window for those looking to trade or at least watch tape. After taking a day off for turkey and fixings, a core team of traders return for an abbreviated Black Friday session; U.S. stock markets close at 1 p.m. Eastern time and bonds close an hour later.

The chart above, from Dow Jones Market Data, examines the last 73 Black Fridays (excluding today, of course) and finds that the post-holiday session produced a rally 70% of the time, with an average gain of around 0.3%. . But lately performance has been a little less impressive; It caused an average decrease of 0.3% in the last 10 years and only 0.1% in the last 20 years.