“I’m not convinced by the rally, not at all,” Mr Weston said. “Volumes are rubbish. There’s no conviction - I just feel people are absolutely knackered.”

Given the speed of the rebound, coming despite a torrent of bad news on the state of the local and global economy, Mr Weston believes there’s a lot of scepticism among investors.

“After everything we’ve seen, people are not sure whether they should chase this rally,” he said. Should they put money to work now, has it just been a short-covering rally, or is it due to month-end positioning.”

Fitting with the ugly close, all sectors finished lower, led by REITs which tumbled 8.7 per cent. Healthcare also slumped 7.1 per cent.

Among the big names, Scentre Group tanked 12.5 per cent to $1.51 while Goodman Group shed 10.7 per cent to $11.13.

CSL fell 7.6 per cent to $279.12 while all of the big four banks tumbled by more than 6.3 per cent, led by ANZ with a fall of 7.4 per cent to $15.47.

Wesfarmers and Transurban also skidded more than 7 per cent, closing at $32.25 and $11.84 per cent respectively.

Charter Hall Group was the worst performer on the benchmark index, finishing with a loss of 14.7 per cent to $2.96. ALS sat at the other end of the scoreboard, gaining 5.5 per cent to $5.39.

As for when a sustained rebound in equity markets will occur, Mr Weston said it will come down to when businesses begin to come back online

“The defining moment will be when activity levels start to normalise,” he said. “You look at anyone’s forecasts, consensus looks for a disastrous June quarter followed by a big snap-back in the September quarter with a lot of stimulus.

“Anything that makes me question that the September quarter won’t as goods as everyone thinks, then I think equities will take another leg lower.”