It was an uneasy day for health-care stocks—until the very end.
Rumors started flying when the US House of Representatives went into recess at 3:30pm on March 24. The official announcement that House Republicans had pulled their health-care bill—a key component of US president Donald Trump’s election campaign—followed soon after.
The market reaction was immediate. The S&P 500 health-care sector, which had erased its gains in the hour before the scheduled House vote, bounced back. The sector ended the day flat. The S&P 500 also finished flat, rebounding from the slight loss it was on track to post before the GOP pulled the bill.
Edwards Lifesciences, Bristol-Meyers Squibb, and Vertex Pharmaceuticals were among the health-care stocks to recover noticeably. Check out the jump around 3:30pm in each of the charts below: