Asian markets, oil prices plunge as Wall Street bleeds over Trump’s tariffs
Asian Stock Market Crash: US futures also signaled further weakness. The future for the S&P 500 lost 4.2% while that for the Dow Jones Industrial Average shed 3.5%. The future for the Nasdaq lost 5.3%.
Tokyo's Nikkei 225 index lost nearly 8% shortly after the market opened and Australia's S&P/ASX 200 tumbled more than 6%. South Korea's Kospi lost 4.4%. (Photo/Kyodo News via AP) Asian Stock Market News Today: Asian stock markets nosedived Monday as US futures pointed to significant losses on Wall Street over United States President Donald Trump’s sweeping tariffs last week. Oil prices also sank further with US benchmark crude down 4 per cent.
Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 index lost nearly 8% shortly after the market opened and Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 tumbled more than 6%. South Korea’s Kospi lost 4.4%.
This comes after the Wall Street witnessed a massive meltdown on Friday after Trump’s tariff hikes and the backlash from China ignited fears of an all-out trade war and raised the risk of a global economic recession. In the US markets, stocks of companies that do business in Beijing fell to some of the sharpest losses.
US futures market, which are an implied measure for how stocks will act when the markets do open, also signalled further weakness. The future for the S&P 500 lost 4.2% while that for the Dow Jones Industrial Average shed 3.5%. The future for the Nasdaq lost 5.3%.
In oil rates, the US benchmark crude was down $2.50 at $59.49 per barrel. Brent crude, the international standard, gave up $2.25 to $63.33 a barrel. The price of crude oil tumbled to its lowest level on Friday since 2021.
Markets on Friday
On Friday, Wall Street’s worst crisis since COVID slammed into a higher gear. “It is the first time the Dow has closed in correction since March 7, 2022,” according to a report by CNN.
The S&P 500 plummeted 6% and the Dow went down by 2,231 points, or 5.5%. The S&P 500 was 5.97% lower. The Nasdaq Composite plunged by 5.82%.
The Dow closed in correction, down more than 10% from its record high in December last year. Stocks for all but 14 of the 500 companies within the S&P 500 index fell Friday. The S&P 500 is down 17.4% from its record set in February.
The losses came after China matched Trump’s big raise in tariffs announced last week, upping the stakes in a trade war that could end with a recession that hurts everyone. Even a better-than-expected report on the US job market, usually the economic highlight of each month, wasn’t enough to stop the slide.
China’s response to US tariffs caused an immediate acceleration of losses in markets worldwide. The Commerce Ministry in Beijing said it would respond to the 34% tariffs imposed by the US on imports from China with its own 34% tariff on imports of all U.S. products beginning April 10, among other measures. The United States and China are the world’s two largest economies.
Trump calls his tariffs ‘medicine’
On the massive sell-off, Trump said he didn’t want global markets to fall, “but sometimes you have to take medicine to fix something.” His comments came as global financial markets appeared on track to continue sharp declines once trading resumes Monday.
“I spoke to a lot of leaders, European, Asian, from all over the world. They’re dying to make a deal. And I said, we’re not going to have deficits with your country. We’re not going to do that, because to me a deficit is a loss. We’re going to have surpluses or at worst, going to be breaking even,” he added on Sunday.
Tariffs could drive up expectations for inflation and lower rates could fuel still more price increases, Fed Chair Jerome Powell was quoted as saying by news agency AP. “Our obligation is to keep longer-term inflation expectations well anchored and to make certain that a one-time increase in the price level does not become an ongoing inflation problem,” Powell said on Friday.
Further, market corrections are fairly common in the US. Since 1929, the S&P 500 has logged a correction 56 times, according to a Reuters analysis of data from Yardeni Research.
— With inputs from AP, Reuters
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