us stocks finished higher in volatile trading on thursday clawing back some of the wednesdays selloff as investors attempted to shake off concerns about bankingsector stability and the impact of an expected credit crunch the dow fell 530 points on wednesday as treasury secretary janet yellens remark that her department hadnt discussed blanket protections for bank deposits appeared to overshadow the federal reserves latest interestrate hike us stocks indexes rallied to finish modestly higher on thursday after wavering between gains and losses in the afternoon trading as investors reassessed treasury secretary janet yellens comments on bank failures and the federal reserves rate path after its interestrate decisions on wednesday stocks ended sharply lower after yellen said that there was no discussion on insuring all bank deposits yellen told a senate committee that blanket deposit insurance hadnt been considered or discussed by her department however yellen also said late thursday the federal government would take extra steps to stabilize the us banking system if necessary in prepared remarks for a house hearing we have used important tools to act quickly to prevent contagion yellen said and they are tools we could use again see yellen says us would take additional actions on bank system if necessary regional stocks tumbled on thursday with shares of regional lender first republic bank frc dropped 6 and the spdr sp regional banking etf kre declined by 28 however technology stocks managed to gain as treasury yields declined with the microsoft msft apple aapl and nvidia nvda ending up fed chair jerome powell said in a press conference on wednesday that the us banking system remains sound and resilient with strong capital and liquidity with fed actions in recent weeks demonstrating that all depositor savings in the banking system are safe the contradictions between powells comments and yellens were confusing to the markets but yellens remarks on wednesday were seen as backtracking on her commitment to helping keep small banks and their depositors safe in the event of panic setting in which is the leading cause of contagion wrote quincy krosby chief global strategist for lpl financial the last thing markets need now is confusion and reneging from its top government officials but that is exactly what happened see debate over expanding deposit insurance weighs on bank stocks heres what to know seeregional banks get the attention but worries are more widespread says exfdic chief bair however powell said in the following press conference that the process of getting inflation lower still has a long way to go and rate cuts are not in their base case for the remainder of 2023 yesterdays steep market selloff occurred after powell attempted to walk a narrow path between maintaining bank stability and fighting inflation in doing so he struck a cautionary tone that dashed investors hopes that he would provide a dovish outlook for monetary policy said josé torres senior economist of interactive brokers despite powells hawkish tone markets rallied on thursday morning as investors believe the fed has finished hiking rates and will begin cutting them as soon as july torres said meanwhile citigroup ceo jane frasers comments pushing back against creditcrisis fears while speaking at the economic club of washington dc also helped restore the confidence of market participants this is not a credit crisis this is a situation where its a few banks that have some problems fraser said her comments initially may have had a calming effect on markets said rich farr chief market strategist at merion capital group during a phone interview with marketwatch he credited her remarks for helping to push us stock futures and asian markets higher overnight the us central bank on wednesday raised rates by an expected 25 basis points while its statement said it anticipates some additional policy firming may be appropriate to bring inflation to its 2 target that wording is a departure from previous statements which indicated ongoing increases would be appropriate to bring down inflation see the stock market hit a pandemic bottom 3 years ago heres how it has performed since then economic data released thursday showed the number of americans applying for unemployment benefits last week declined to 191000 the lowest number in three weeks new data released thursday showed newhome sales of 640000 in february compared with a revised 633000 in january outside the us both the swiss national bank and bank of england delivered interestrate hikes less than 24 hours after the feds the swiss central bank lifted borrowing costs by 50 basis points after local authorities helped put together a hastily arranged deal for ubs group ubs to take over scandalscarred crosstown rival credit suisse group csgneb credit suisse shares have fallen by 90 over the past year according to factset in the uk the bank of england raised its policy rate by 25 basis points its 11th consecutive increase see alsocoinbases stock tumbles on sec warning while first republic and regeneron shares rally and other stocks on the move this content was created by marketwatch which is operated by dow jones  co marketwatch is published independently from dow jones newswires and the wall street journal