US stock markets have posted their first negative quarter since the pandemic began, with a selloff in technology stocks on the threat of higher valuations the primary contributor.
On Thursday, all three benchmarks were down, led by the Dow Jones and S&P 500 which both fell 1.6%, closely followed by the Nasdaq, down 1.5% with the pace of the selloff accelerating into the close.
Oil supplies cut, retail spending dips
The retreat came despite President Biden announcing the release of 1 million barrels of oil per day from government stockpiles which has the oil price falling, now sitting close to US$100 per barrel. This is expected to reduce the cost of almost everything and stave off growing inflation.
Consumer inflation hit 6.4% year-on-year via the Fed’s preferred measure, however, this comes as consumer spending slowed to a pace of just 0.2% growth in February, more than half less than expected. Services spending is once again taking over for products. Airlines have been a key beneficiary, with United Airlines (NASDAQ: UAL) shares up 1.3%.
Baidu on regulatory watch, UiPath share price tumbles
Baidu (NASDAQ: BIDU) shares fell 8% after regulators in the US flagged the company for a potential delisting. Baidu, along with four other Chinese companies, have been added to the SEC’s provisional watchlist of foreign companies that face delisting if they don’t allow US regulators to review their audits for three consecutive years.
Meanwhile, shares in robotic automation software group UiPath (NYSE: PATH) fell 25% after reporting a bigger than expected loss for the quarter.
US stock market movers
These popular US stocks were among the biggest movers on Thursday.
- Splunk (NASDAQ: SPLK) up 4.6%
- Carnival (NYSE: CCL) up 3.2%
- Shopify (NYSE: SHOP) down 4.2%
- Zoom (NASDAQ: ZM) down 4.2%
- Etsy (NASDAQ: ETSY) down 7.6%
- Advanced Micro Devices (NASDAQ: AMD) down 8.3%
Back home on the ASX, the S&P/ASX 200 (ASX: XJO) is tipped to follow US stock markets lower at the open this morning. For a round-up of the latest news, check out my ASX 200 morning report.