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Stocks slide as heightened Ukraine tensions weigh

Published 02/17/2022, 07:44 AM
Updated 02/17/2022, 07:50 PM
© Reuters. FILE PHOTO: A street sign on Wall Street outside the New York Stock Exchange September 18, 2007.  REUTERS/Brendan McDermid/File Photo

© Reuters. FILE PHOTO: A street sign on Wall Street outside the New York Stock Exchange September 18, 2007. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid/File Photo

By Chuck Mikolajczak

NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. stocks slid on Thursday, with the S&P 500 marking its biggest daily percentage drop in two weeks, as investors shifted to defensive sectors and safe havens such as bonds and gold as geopolitical tensions between Washington and Russia over Ukraine flared.

After Ukrainian forces and pro-Moscow rebels traded fire in eastern Ukraine, U.S. President Joe Biden said there was every indication Russia was planning to invade in the next few days and was preparing a pretext to justify it.

Russia accused Biden of stoking tensions and released a strongly worded letter saying Washington was ignoring its security demands and threatening unspecified "military-technical measures".

On Wall Street, the growth-oriented technology and communication services sectors were among the hardest hit. Financials also declined as U.S. Treasury yields moved lower.

Developments in Ukraine have added to uncertainty about the path of the Federal Reserve's tightening plans to fight inflation.

"There's a lot of nervousness out there and as we approach the weekend nothing’s been settled between Russia and Ukraine," said Michael James, managing director, equity trading at Wedbush Securities in Los Angeles.

"The continued weakness, especially in the growth names, is indicative of elevated nervousness and sellers continuing to swamp buyers in just about every stock."

The defensive utilities and consumer staples sectors were Wall Street's only advancers, with staples getting a lift from a 4.01% jump in Walmart (NYSE:WMT) after it posted record holiday sales.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 622.24 points, or 1.78%, to 34,312.03, the S&P 500 lost 94.75 points, or 2.12%, to 4,380.26 and the Nasdaq Composite dropped 407.38 points, or 2.88%, to 13,716.72.

The drop for the Dow was the biggest daily percentage decline since Nov. 30 while the Nasdaq's decline was its largest percentage fall since Feb. 3.

With the end of earnings season on the horizon, chipmaker Nvidia (NASDAQ:NVDA) tumbled 7.51% as flat gross margins and concern about its exposure to the crypto market overshadowed an upbeat current-quarter revenue forecast, and helped give the Philadelphia Semiconductor index its first daily decline this week.

TripAdvisor Inc (NASDAQ:TRIP) lost 2.50% after the hotel search website operator posted a surprise fourth-quarter loss. Albemarle (NYSE:ALB) Corp plunged 19.91% as the lithium producer forecast downbeat annual earnings.

As risk aversion pushed bond yields lower, big banks including JPMorgan Chase (NYSE:JPM), Morgan Stanley (NYSE:MS) and Bank of America (NYSE:BAC) all lost ground. Goldman Sachs (NYSE:GS) and Wells Fargo (NYSE:WFC) fell even after positive outlooks from the lenders.

Gold was another beneficiary of the move toward safer assets, touching an eight-month high of $1,900.99 an ounce.

Among other big movers, DoorDash Inc shot up 10.69% after it reported upbeat quarterly revenue as food delivery demand showed no sign of slowing.

Hasbro Inc (NASDAQ:HAS) gained 2.09% after activist investor Alta Fox Capital Management nominated five directors to the toymaker's board and urged changes including a spinoff of its unit housing games such as "Dungeons & Dragons".

© Reuters. FILE PHOTO: A street sign on Wall Street outside the New York Stock Exchange September 18, 2007.  REUTERS/Brendan McDermid/File Photo

Declining issues outnumbered advancing ones on the NYSE by a 2.81-to-1 ratio; on Nasdaq, a 3.63-to-1 ratio favored decliners.

The S&P 500 posted 6 new 52-week highs and 19 new lows; the Nasdaq Composite recorded 27 new highs and 249 new lows.

Latest comments

just wait, JoBee is getting the dose of cognitive therapy drugs while in his basement, let's see what happens 😉
This conflict is all dictator Putins creation. Stuck in a cold war mindset, refusing to accept a new reality. Russia, with all it's resources, could have been a top 5 economy if not cleptocrat Putin and hos kgb men had stolen and siphoned off the country's wealth
other than oil/gas/coal export, not much going on for Russia economy, and in another 20-30 years the demand for oil/gas are just not going to be the same, just as what you are seeing now for coal.....
we're all on here commenting because we're all being played by the media, as usual
it’s so easy to spot the Fox and Friends Crowd, if you stopped watching so much tv, and expand your information sources, you would be less afraid and angry and maybe even happy. US is a pretty good country to live in. Life expectancy is decent, literacy rate is ok, except for our bipolar political parties things are pretty good.
then quit ruining it
bipolar?? I'm sure you'd be happier in a commune where everyone thinks the same,...or needs to.
You guys still ****people with guns for fun? US great place to live for whites
ps biden and trump are not so different one bias to left the other to the right but both are populists: helicopter money when people are already saving, trade war on china, america first, totally self inflected this not the end.
this conflict is irrelevant for the markets its about failure of qe and inflation which is the only game in town.
thank God biden is president. imagine how Trump would handle the crisis in Ukraine, selling out Ukraine and it's people, to his buddy Dictator Putin, for a trump tower in downtown Moscow.
Alexander You are completely clueless aren't you. Trump made the withdrawal agreement with Taliban in February 2020
 "Biden already handled Afghanistan to talibs"  -- except for the fact that Trump is the one who signed the withdrawal agreement with the Taliban, nice try though
 "the only thing Obama gave was Crimea to Putin."   -- short of sending in NATO troops, what would your president orange have done differently from Obama to prevent Putin invading Crimea???
thank God biden is president. imagine how he would handle the crisis in Ukraine, selling out Ukraine and it's people, to his buddy Dictator Putin, for a trump tower in downtown Moscow.
🤣🤣🤣🤡🤡🤡
Puts expire tomorrow, so how to scare the market this week? Use military tensions every second day  or how inflation caught the entire FED committee by surprise again...
psychological warfare on western economy's is all Putin is doing he will leave the military there for months in order to get financial systems to crash... he knows what he's doing... checkmate
Many puts expire tomorrow.
Can you share what will be expected on the date of expiry? More price decline? Thanks
send the web
Monthlys expire 2moro so bigger volume vs any other Feb week. More volatile as option sellers need to deliver or buy back contracts so as market moves these option sellers will need to buy or sell stock to ensure they are covered. Could put pressure on either direction depending on news or events. Good news will drive it further north as shorts those selling calls naked will have to buy and potentially those who are short stock and sold puts will cover shorts. open int is larger on put side likely why today's move continued all day so bad news could increase these short sales to cover the puts that expire 2moro. Hope that makes some sense and helps
world was more peaceful with trump...
More peacefull, that is hilarious, the man tried to start a coup. When he wasn’t playing golf he was starting a new crisis every day. Trump tweeted this, trump hates that, he was fighting with every country on the planet, except the bad ones, those he loved. ! it was a very unpleasant 4 years
Remember when he tried to defund NATO?
He only pushed those cheap Europeans to pay their dues
only thing im happy about is google dropping and im about to invest a goid amount gor my kids everything else is justvrubbush.
when putin said pullback more troops to base, gold would drop to floor
 I guess you ain't doing very well with your frothy stocks mate.
Pitin is playng games with Biden
no. putin is NOT. the media is playing games WITH YOU
Coming from biden supporter, that’s hilarious. Tell us again who got played by the media
I see by your comments you’re not biden supporter, my bad
Dems are crashing da market only GOP can manage da stockmarket
nice try the stock market has gone up more under dems than republicans, could change with this administration though
Why to play tricks as if it's Millitary is being withdrawn? Nowadays War means destruction only, who will be benefited in the war? All ridiculous...
Well, not sure about the last part. US benefitted from WWII, now for almost 80 years.
 I thought the whole world benefited from ***being defeated?
:) Investing.com won't let me say H**tler - ok, how about the 3rd Reich
Where is the war? In the nightmare of american gov lol
all lies. assign a lie for why its going down while the elites get out.tge mkt is in distribution by the same peolle that brought covid to yo. the same peolle thatown 90%plus of the media.they're telling you its Russia when it's them if you haven't woken up to the total Lie that is the american media and politics. go back to bed. your dog has more intellect.
The contrast in narrative is fascinating when looking for information on the Ukraine/Russian "conflict" in the TASS Russian News Agency or The Moscow Times.
because it doesn't exist. the mkt is is distribution by the elites but they dont want you to know the truth otherwise they'd be competing withu
We miss you Trump !
No, only you
Usa gov has nightmares .
The gov causes nightmares!
I've never seen a team of broken arms like them since Biden came to power, it's a disaster
Rigged elections and rigged pandemics have consequences
facts
the old presidents are doing everything to make you run away from the stock exchange in order to raise the rate by 0.75% in March. this will be a lesson for all of us - never vote for old people
The LAST thing this country is a genuinely WOKE POTUS.
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