NEW YORK, New York - U.S. stocks, after plunging to year lows, finally changed direction Wednesday, with investors snapping up equities across the board.

As the Bank of England began buying longer-dated Gilts, the British pound stabilized. The focus however remains on central banks across the work and their plans to aggressively hike interest rates ina b id to stem seemingly out-of-control inflation. At the same time they risk pushing their economies into recession.

"Our central case is a hard landing by the end of '23," billionaire investor Stanley Druckenmiller told CNBC's Delivering Alpha Investor Summit in New York City Wednesday. "I will be stunned if we don't have recession in '23. I don't know the timing but certainly by the end of '23. I will not be surprised if it's not larger than the so called average garden variety," he said.

Technology stocks did best percentage-wise Wednesday with the Nasdaq Composite climbing 222.13 points or 2.05 percent to 11,051.64.

The Dow Jones industrials surged 548.75 points or 1.88 percent to 29,683.74.

The Standard and Poor's 500 added 71.75 points or 1.97 percent to 3,719.04.

With the stabilization of the pound, and the rush back into stocks, the U.S. dollar's recent extended rally came to a crashing halt. The euro rebounded to 1.0730 around the New York close Wednesday. The British pound rallied to n1.0883. The Japanese yen improved to 1444.15. The Swiss franc firmed to 0.9765.

The Canadian dollar jumped to 1.3626. The Australian dollar recovered to 0.6516. The New Zelaand dollar climbed to 0.5721.

On overseas equity markets, the Paris-based CAC 40 gained 0.19 percent. The Dax in Germany advanced 0.36 percent. In London, the FTSE 100 closed 0.30 percent higher.

In Hong Kong, the Hang Seng tumbled a hefty 609.43 points or 3.41 percent to 17,250.88.

China's Shanghai Composite fell 48.79 points or 1.58 percent to 3,045.07.

In Japan, the Nikkei 225 dived 397.89 points, or 1.50 percent, to 26,173.98.

South Korea's Kospi Composite tumbled 54.57 points or a hefty 2.45 percent to 2,169.29.

The Australian All Ordinaries sank 36.70 points or 0.55 percent to 6,659.80.

In New Zealand, the S&P/NZX 50 declined 94.92 points or 0.85 percent to 11,119.57.