Trump Tariff Tailspin Worsens With Dow Nosedives Further 2 231 Pts S P 500 Loses Us 5 Tril In Two Day Sell Off

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WALL Street plunged for a second straight day on Friday (April 4), confirming the Nasdaq Composite was in a bear market and the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) was in a correction (from its record closing high of 45,014.04 on Dec 4) as an escalating global trade war spurred the biggest losses since the global pandemic.
The Dow, S&P 500 and the Nasdaq Composite posted their largest two-day declines since COVID-19 sparked global panic during US President Donald Trump’s first term.
For Thursday (April 3) and Friday, the Dow was down 9.3% to 38,314.86; the S&P 500 (10.5% to 5,074.08); and the Nasdaq (11.4% to 15,587.79).
The CBOE Volatility Index or Wall Street’s fear gauge closed at the highest level since April 2020, ending Friday’s trading session at 45.31, a level last reached in the opening months of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Since late on Wednesday (April 2) when Trump boosted tariff barriers to their highest level in more than a century, investors have dumped stocks, fearing both the new US economic reality and also how US trading partners might retaliate by steepening their own trade barriers.
As it is, global stock markets have extended their rout on Friday with a further US$3 tril wiped out from S&P 500 companies as investors fled to the safety of government bonds.

That US$5-tril loss marked a record two-day decline for the S&P 500 benchmark – exceeding a two-day loss of US$3.3 tril in March 2020 – when the pandemic ripped across global markets, according to LSEG data compiled by Reuters.
Responding to Trump’s tariffs, China on Friday said it would impose additional levies of 34% on American goods, confirming investor fears that a full-blown global trade war is under way and that the global economy may be at risk of a recession.
Trump slapped a 10% tariff on most US imports and much higher levies on dozens of countries, erecting the steepest trade barriers in more than 100 years.
“It’s sort of the worst fears of where the tariff programmer was headed,” said Rick Meckler, partner at Cherry Lane Investments, a family investment office in New Vernon, New Jersey.
“For those investors who were sure it was just a negotiation – while that still may be true at some point – it’s getting awfully deeper into the detail and more dangerous for companies.”
Companies with exposure to China fell across the board with Apple dropping 7.3%. The chipmakers index sank 7.6% while bank and energy shares plummeted amid the recession fears. –  Focus Malaysia

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