Stock markets tumbled on Monday, on track for their worst day of the year as investors fretted about the economy after President Trump refused to rule out the possibility of a recession caused by his trade policies.
The S&P 500 slid more than 2 percent in afternoon trading on Wall Street, dragging portfolios even lower following three straight weeks of selling. The index is now more than 8 percent below a record high set last month, approaching a “correction,” a Wall Street term for a decline of 10 percent or more from a recent high.
“The markets are scared of the uncertainty that the tariff rhetoric is bringing,” said Andrew Brenner, head of international fixed income at National Alliance Securities. The S&P 500 is now slightly down from Election Day, erasing all of the gains it made since the vote, and then some.
The tech-heavy Nasdaq has been hit even harder, as the rally driven by enthusiasm for artificial intelligence reversed course. The index fell into a correction last week, and dropped more than 3 percent on Monday. Tesla’s shares plunged more than 11 percent, while Alphabet, Apple and Nvidia each fell over 4 percent.
“There’s just no support in the tech stocks right now,” said Larry Tentarelli, the chief technical strategist at Blue Chip Daily Trend Report. Many tech companies have grown so large that movements in their stocks have an outsize influence on the broader market.
Stocks in Europe and Asia also came under pressure but the declines paled in comparison to losses in the United States. An index tracking the eurozone’s largest public companies, which hit a record high last week, dropped 1.6 percent. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index fell more than 1.8 percent.
Investors seeking havens continued to opt for the relative safety of bonds, pushing down the 10-year U.S. Treasury yield to 4.23 percent; bond prices move inversely to yields. The combination of falling stocks and declining interest rates is often seen as a sign of economic unease.
Those worries are partly reflected by traders’ bets that the Federal Reserve will resume cutting the rate it controls, pricing in three cuts this year, according to CME FedWatch. Stock investors generally embrace rate reductions, which lower the cost of borrowing for businesses and consumers, but not when they are spurred by concerns about economic growth.
In a Fox News interview that aired on Sunday, President Trump refused to rule out the possibility that his policies would cause a recession.
Over the past few weeks, Mr. Trump has threatened, imposed, suspended and resumed tariffs on America’s largest trade partners: Canada, Mexico and China. The dizzying shifts, including last-minute exemptions for some automakers and energy products, have led to heightened uncertainty, unnerving investors.
“The market volatility is much less about the bad news of tariffs and much more about the uncertainty of tariffs, especially uncertainty as to what the policy is, where it is headed, how long it will last and what the end result will be,” said David Bahnsen, the chief investment officer at the Bahnsen Group.
By most measures, the U.S. economy is still solid, with the latest data on hiring holding steady. But economists have turned gloomier as they come to grips with Mr. Trump’s seesawing approach to tariffs, which has hamstrung businesses trying to plan investments and hiring. Cuts to the federal work force and government spending freezes have also dented consumer sentiment.
A report on inflation due this week will be closely watched, as surveys of consumers suggest that they expect price increases to pick up, a potentially worrying sign for the Fed as it tries to bring inflation down further. The rising cost of eggs and other necessities has squeezed shoppers’ wallets, and tariffs and mass deportations could push prices higher.
U.S. stocks have underperformed markets elsewhere in recent weeks. Given a murkier outlook for the American economy, “the recent moves might well have further to go,” Jan Hatzius, the chief economist at Goldman Sachs, said in a note on Monday. Strategists at the bank recently increased the chances of a U.S. recession in the coming year to 20 percent.
Analysts at JPMorgan Chase warned in a report that the spillover from a possible U.S. slowdown has resulted in a “materially higher risk of a global recession this year due to extreme U.S. policies.” They put the probability of such a downturn at 40 percent.
On Monday, retaliatory tariffs by China on U.S. agricultural products came into effect. On Wednesday, the Trump administration is set to put in place a 25 percent tariff on all steel and aluminum imports. Mr. Trump has also threatened to impose “reciprocal tariffs” on all U.S. imports to match other countries’ tariffs and trading policies next month.
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