Investors dumped technology stocks in a vicious Nasdaq sell-off overnight after the Federal Reserve turned increasingly hawkish as it mulls interest rate rises in a battle to combat rampant US inflation.
The Fed’s latest meeting minutes suggested a potentially quicker path toward raising interest rates, spooking investors and handing the Nasdaq its worst daily performance in nearly a year. The Nasdaq Composite slumped more than 500 points, or 3.34%, to close at 15,586.30, its most savage single day sell-off since February 2021 as a New Year rout in technology stocks deepened.
| Mega-cap tech | |
| Alphabet | -4.68% |
| Microsoft | -3.84% |
| Meta Platforms | -3.67% |
| Apple | -2.66% |
| Amazon | -1.89% |
| Tesla | -5.35% |
| Source: koyfin | |
Mega-cap tech all lost ground, led by Google-owner Alphabet’s near-5% decline. Tesla, a big winner through 2021 and currently the fifth largest US listed company worth $1.2 trillion, lost more than 5%.
The index of US tech’s 100 largest firms - the Nasdaq 100 - lost 3.1% to finish at 15,771.78, with 90 out of the 100 stocks closing lower.
| Nasdaq's biggest fallers | |
| MercadoLibre | -9.00% |
| Datadog | -7.76% |
| Moderna | -7.65% |
| Okta | -7.64% |
| Align Technology | -7.16% |
| Adobe | -7.14% |
| Lucid | -6.94% |
| Zscaler | -6.83% |
| DocuSign | -6.65% |
| Xilinx | -6.16% |
| Source: Koyfin | |
Nasdaq 100 stocks that did manage to survive the sell-off were largely tech-lite companies, such as industrials conglomerate Mondelez and energy firm Xcel Energy and Walgreens Boots, the health retail chain.
| Defying the sell-off | |
| Mondelez | 1.44% |
| Intel | 1.37% |
| T-Mobile | 1.14% |
| Honeywell | 0.99% |
| Xcel Energy | 0.98% |
| Walgreens Boots | 0.97% |
| American Electric Power | 0.92% |
| PACCAR | 0.37% |
| Pepsi | 0.34% |
| Comcast | 0.06% |
| Source: Koyfin | |
Futures suggest that investors are reluctant to go bargain hunting when trading re-starts later today, with Nasdaq 100 futures nudging up just 0.02%.
