Investors moved back into the battered stock market yesterday, sending Dow Jones industrials sharply higher and helping the technology-dominated Nasdaq edge back from a steep decline to finish modestly lower.

On Wall Street, the Dow Jones rose 124.72, or 1.1 per cent, to 11,122.65. Following Tuesday's loss of 359.58, the blue-chip index rose as much as 216 points in early trading. The Nasdaq ended a highly volatile session at 3,877.60, a loss of 24.09 points, or 0.6 per cent. In early trading, the index fell as much as 166 points and appeared likely to extend yesterday's record plunge of 229 points. According to preliminary calculations, the Standard and Poor's 500 rose 2.69 to 1,402.11. The Russell 2000 index of smaller companies rose 0.45 to 478.83.

NYSE volume totalled 1.07 billion shares at the close, compared to 983.62 million in the previous session.