A broad sell-off sent all three major US stock indexes more than 1 percent lower by the closing bell, as risk appetite was dampened by a combination of persistent fears over potential disruption due to emergent artificial intelligence technology and Trump’s erratic statements on trade policy, which fuelled much of the market volatility during the first year of the president’s second term.
Financial stocks were off 3.3 percent, while software-related firms slid 4.3 percent amid ongoing AI disruption fears.
“The question about AI is twofold: How much is it going to cost, and who is going to be disrupted?” said Tom Hainlin, national investment strategist at US Bank Wealth Management in Minneapolis. “You’ve seen the market react to headlines, it’s ‘sell first, assess later.'”
He added: “It’s a perspective of what may happen as opposed to what has happened.”
On Friday, the top court in the United States issued a 6-3 ruling that Trump had overstepped his presidential authority by enacting reciprocal tariffs under an economic emergency law, a ruling that provoked condemnation from the president, who threatened a 15 percent temporary tariff on all imports, despite having reached trade agreements with many US trading partners.
Gold prices, benefiting from a flight to safety, surged 2.6 percent.
A powerful winter storm buried much of the US under more than 15 inches of snow and paralysed travel in the Northeast. At airports in the New York City area, 89 percent to 98 percent of flights were cancelled, according to Flightaware.com.
Airlines and travel/leisure-related stocks tumbled 3.8 percent and 3.7 percent, respectively. Dow Transports dropped 2.9 percent.
The Dow fell 1.7 percent to 48,804, the S&P 500 fell 1 percent, to 6,837, while the Nasdaq fell 1.1 percent, to 22,627. (Reuters)
Edited by Cecil Wong
