It's a Total Global Bloodbath Today!
This morning, the S&P 500 joined the bear parade and crashed into a full-blown bear market. So did EVERYTHING ELSE that is melting down around the world this morning!
The headlines are loud and clear: Stocks are plunging again … relentlessly as the world wakes up to realize the Trump Trade War isn’t going away in mere days and is exacting a very heavy price all over the word but especially in the US. If the morning results hold, the S&P will close the day in a full bear-market crash, joining the Russell 2000 and the Nasdaq, which both arrived there last week. Big-money investor and Trump promoter Bill Ackman even said today that we are heading into a “self-induced economic nuclear winter, and we should start hunkering down.”
It’s another Black Monday in Japan as Japanese stocks experienced their biggest crash since the spectacular 1987 record plunge on a Monday long ago. In fact, the Nikkei 225 index of leading stocks in Tokyo saw its worst point-drop bloodbath in history. The Nikkei is now fully in bear territory at 25% down from its high.
Yes, everything is crashing:
The S&P 500 opened down 4%, entering "bear market" territory as it officially fell to below 20% from its most recent high. The tech-heavy Nasdaq declined more than 4.5%. The Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 3.78% or 1,200 points.
The hammer blow of President Donald Trump's tariffs reverberated around the world overnight across the major indexes in Europe and Asia, where markets opened to a bloodbath and automatic circuit breakers triggered in some places to stop stocks crashing.
Even the price of bitcoin … Fell as much as 1.2%. Over the weekend, it fell more than 7%.
The main U.S. benchmark for crude oil fell to its lowest price since April 2021, before slightly bouncing back and wavering at around $63 a barrel….
Rather than simply taxing imports, Trump has sought to upend an entire economic order premised on free trade and the U.S. transition to a service-oriented economy from a manufacturing-intensive one.
The cost to the U.S. of switching back to being a manufacturing-based, export-oriented economy is virtually incalculable, since it would also likely entail a relatively lower standard of living for the majority of U.S. residents for an indefinite period of time as wages declined in order to be competitive with the rest of the world.
Trump continued to signal little intention to back off his proposals Monday.
China’s stocks have also entered a bear market.
Fears of a sharp slowdown in the US economy have raised expectations that the Federal Reserve will have to slash interest rates, and the Federal Reserve actually called an emergency meeting to go over interest-rate policy today.
“The buzz is all about the contagion effect of this aggressive bear onslaught, underscored by fears of a hard landing in the US and a severe meltdown in Tokyo’s markets, which now appear to be self-perpetuating,” said Stephen Innes, managing partner of SPI Asset Management.
Trading was halted for short periods of time in Japan and South Korea as circuit breakers designed to prevent panic selling were triggered multiple times.
Wall Street is now also fearing a 1987-style Black-Monday meltdown. In fact, word on the Street is that the past week’s plunge could look tame compared to the full waterfall that is forming. The meltdown now is global:
Analysts fear last week’s $6.6 trillion wipeout was just the beginning….
In early Monday morning trading in Asia — Sunday night US time - Japan's Nikkei cratered as much as 8 percent. Australia was down 6 per cent, South Korea 5 per cent, Taiwan almost 10 percent, Singapore 8.5 percent, Hong Kong 10 per cent and China almost 5 percent….
CNBC host and market analyst Jim Cramer warned that the US could be barreling toward another Black Monday.
The 1987 crash — a 22.6 percent drop in a single day — remains the worst in modern market history, far eclipsing the chaos of 2008 or even the Covid crash.
The VIX, a gauge of market volatility, has spiked to very high reading of 60.
US equity futures are pointing to another day of staggering losses - even as they rise from session lows - as Trump doubled down on sweeping tariffs and as the world continues its flight to safety….
For a sense of how much panic there was around the European open, look no further than the VIX which briefly topped 60.
Everything is going nuts today, including the QAnon nuts, which I’ll get to below.
Inflation and chaos to run wild
As for that high inflation I have promised you is coming back when no one was seeing it, JPMorgan analysts wrote to clients Friday that…
the pinch from higher prices that we expect in coming months may hit harder than in the post-pandemic inflation spike.
Let me remind you that big inflationary pinch hasn’t stopped pinching since it began. It was more like a T-Rex chomp.
Trump prematurely announced, however, there is no sign of inflation today. Of course, there isn’t if you’re just looking at the government inflation indices. The biggest tariffs he announced don’t even go into effect until Wednesday. Then we have to wait for the inflation to hit the shelves, then wait for the indices to report it. What we’re seeing in the markets today is a reaction to the news that the big tariffs are coming later this week. It will take awhile for affected products to hit the shelves, and no one is anxious to be the first to have to raise prices in an environment where Americans are sick of inflation. However …
While there were signs of slower activity as the Biden administration wound down, the uncertain business environment Trump has created with his chaotic tariffs rollout has helped to curtail consumer and business sentiment, while overall price growth has continued to linger.
There’s that word again. Chaos … everywhere every day.
Goldman Sachs analysts wrote over the weekend that the "tariff Pandora's box has been opened," adding that the U.S. action against China in particular was "substantially higher than our economists’ previous base case and most investors had expected."
QAnon goes on and on and on
Trump is wrong in claiming that interest paid by consumers has dropped. It hasn’t, but government interest has plummeted, and that has spawned a resurgence of the same kind of QAnon (and on-and-on-and-on) nonsense I had to deal with throughout Trump 1.0 where blind Trump supporters argued endlessly that Trump was playing a game of 4-D chess. I argued back that it had better be a game of 44-triple-D chess that would put even the illustrious Melania to shame because the swamp was clearly swamping him.
I even got a phone call from a major publisher of QAnonsense back then (now out of business) who tried to convince me that Trump was rounding up the reptilians and all the Clinton pedophiles at a pizzeria in order to hold his enemies close so that he could, at the last minute, wage war on all of them on Epstein Island and take the whole smoldering global disorder down at once. I should join him in reporting all of that, he claimed, probably calling me from inside his UFO.
We all know how well that ended. The swamp that Trump drained into the White House basement became a rising flood, as I pointed out endlessly even before he was inaugurated for his first term. It rose out of the basement and seeped across Foggy Bottom and finally flooded over his eyeballs, flushing him out of the White House and out of power, drowning the Trumpster in four years of court battles that almost drained him of all his money.
What follows is the repeat nonsense we have to listen to today as die-hard Anoners rise from the muddy waters to try again to cast a narrative that will explain and calm the destruction that is clearly sweeping over all of us but especially them (one famous Newsmax reporter even admitting today that he was stunned to see how rapidly his own person wealth was knocked down):
Is Trump Intentionally Crashing the Stock Market? Yes, and It’s All Part of His Brilliant Plan.
Ah, yes, the brilliant 44-DDD plan is back. I couldn’t convince QAnon back during Trump 1.0 that there was no brilliant plan, so I doubt I can now either. They will believe what they want to believe and will all parrot each other to try to turn their narrative into reality with their magical chanting.
Alright, guys, let’s talk about the stock market. You may have noticed it’s been acting like a caffeinated squirrel on a trampoline lately. Wild swings, red numbers, financial pundits hyperventilating on TV, the fake news pouncing on the story to throw trash at the president. But what if… that chaos is actually part of the plan?
Uh huh! What if? Same old nonsense. It never dies. We never learn. Or, at least, THEY don’t. Hopefully readers here learned long ago and that’s why you’re gathered here.
Yes, President Trump might be crashing the stock market on purpose—and not because he accidentally bumped into the big red “CRASH” button at Mar-a-Lago. According to a video he posted yesterday on Truth Social, “Trump is crashing the stock market by 20% this month but he’s doing it on purpose.”
How masterful of him. It makes a nice fairy tale. But it’s not really so nice if you get taken in by it.
The video also claims that Warren Buffett reportedly said, “Trump is making the best economic moves he’s seen in over 50 years.”
The video also lies. He didn’t. Just more QAnonsense as the link will show. So, put that to rest.
So either Trump’s playing 5D chess while we’re still stuck on checkers, or this is the most patriotic economic demolition derby ever staged.
We’re not even playing Chinese checkers because Trump has lost all of his marbles. You can fault me for saying what you don’t want to hear; but I’ll bet, just like that QAnon crowd that knew I was all wrong back in the twenty-teens, those who do fault me won’t come back to thank me for being right and trying to warn them, regardless of the cost to my own subscription numbers—not even after the fires of this apocalypse burn down to where they can finally see through the smoke again. They never do.
Let’s break this down. The video lays it out like this: Trump is flooding cash into US Treasuries. That move forces the Federal Reserve Bank to lower interest rates in May. Lower rates mean the government can refinance trillions in debt on the cheap. The dollar weakens, mortgage rates drop, and suddenly refinancing looks as sexy as a tax refund.
They even call it “a wild chess move”—which is honestly the most polite way anyone’s described a market plunge in years.
Yeah, a little too polite for such a tub full of burning blood. The video even had to lie about what Warren Buffet was saying to try to create some kind of fake endorsement for its falsehood. Keep spinning the fantasy, Boys. Don’t bother to fact check anything like I did.
Yes, the dollar will weaken. Never hurts to wrap a lie in some truth to make it go down easier like dog poison wrapped in bacon. Death of the dollar is screaming out as a possibility right now since no one has any use for dollars in a trade-free world! China is already flushing out the dollar today by introducing a new global payment system to replace SWIFT, settling oil sales without the petrodollar.
The government MIGHT get cheaper interest on its debt, whether the Fed joins in with rate cuts, following the plunging safe-haven government bond market yields down just so as to look like the Fed is still in control … or not. I doubt very much their rush to look like they are still the ones setting interest rates will mean lower mortgage rates, however, in a world swirling deep into the perils of recession. Banks are going to be way too uneasy to go long on cheap mortgages! So, you QAnon boys will swirl down the toilet along with your “Big Balls.”
And the tariff plan? Get ready for this. The video claims it’s a “genius play” because it pressures companies to manufacture in the US again.
And that will take three years if they get right on it now—two years for the very quickest among them, five for the slowest. That means they’ll be pumping you QAnoners out of the economic septic tank by the time it happens. Enjoy the swirl!
And just to really stick it to the elites: “94% of all stocks are owned only by 8% of Americans.” So if the market goes down? That’s a Gucci-level problem. According to the video, Trump is “taking from the rich short-term and handing it to the middle class through lower prices.” He’s Robin Hood with a red tie.
Sure. That’s why all the people doing this to you with smarmy smiles on their faces are the billionaires who fill the Trump cabinet and who strut around Mar-a-Lago with the best chocolate cake lingering on their lips while Trump golfs where they can be his economic advisors out on the sunny greens! They’re sticking it to themselves on your behalf because they’re nice like that!
Eggs were the chosen poster child for this one. The libnuts started screaming egg prices were still up only days after Trump was sworn in. Not a good look for the party unless they wanted to look dumb. Yep—cheap eggs, guys, thanks to Trump.
You know what they say, “You have to break a few eggs to make an omelette.” Well, this ain’t gonna be no omelette. It’s just going to be a mess of scrambled eggs with all the egg shells still in the mix. Enjoy your crunchy breakfast, you QAnon basTARDS.
Economania (national & global economic collapse plus market news)
Global stocks and U.S. plunge as Trump tariffs reverberate across the world. S&P joins bear market.
Japanese stocks crash in biggest one-day drop since 1987 as global market rout intensifies
Futures, Global Markets Tumble In Panic Selloff As VIX Hits 60
Newsmax Host Shocked by How Badly Trump Tariffs Tanked His Personal Wealth
Trump ally Bill Ackman warns world is on brink of ‘self-induced economic nuclear winter’
Bond yields tank around the world as investors take cover amid equity rout
As a Result of Trump's Tariffs, the U.S. Emerges as the Biggest Loser in Markets
Trump’s tariffs brought carnage to U.S. stocks. What it will take to stop it.
Tesla Shares Plunge Below Lutnick’s ‘Never This Cheap’ Level
The First Victim of Trump’s Trade War: Michigan’s Economy
‘This is the Trump recession,’ CEOs say, with price increases and job losses coming: CNBC survey
A Trump-triggered trade war could be disastrous
Trump supporters will bear the brunt of tariffs, 30% of U.S. families could go bankrupt: CEO
Money Matters (monetary policy, metals, cryptos, currency wars & going cashless)
Federal Reserve Calls EMERGENCY MEETING Today - Public NOT ALLOWED IN
Inflation Factors (from too much money chasing too few goods due to weather, sanctions, tariffs, quarantines, etc.)
U.S. crude oil plunges below $60 a barrel to lowest since 2021 on tariff-fueled recession fears
Wars & Rumors of War, Revolts, Hacks & Cyberattacks + AI threats
Trump Weakens U.S. Cyberdefenses at a Moment of Rising Danger
Trump and Netanyahu will meet again Monday on Gaza, tariffs and more
Trump Trade Wars & Turf Wars
Taiwan stocks plummet as Taiwan president pledges 'golden age' with US
Beijing’s strong counter tariffs raise the specter of an intense trade war with Washington
Trump’s tariff chaos puts White House on defense as global markets tumble
Frustrated World Leaders Wonder If Trump Even Wants a Deal
Jaguar Land Rover Pauses Vehicle Exports To US After Trump's "Liberation Day"
EU seeks unity in first strike back at Trump tariffs
Political Pandemonium & Social Senescence (socio-political issues & events)
Bessent Defiant on Tariffs as He Rejects a US Recession
Deep Domination (globalism, unelected government, unconstitutional government & censorship)
UK PM Starmer To Make Stunning Admission: 'Globalization Is Over'
Doomer Humor
Failing to grasp the logic of closing comments by free subscribers on your paid columns...
Dear David, there are a few of us old traders still around, the stock market has been in a bubble since 1987 it was always going to pop. The market needed a pin, tariffs was the pin, the world is full of pins. I thought it would be Debt, I was wrong, there is NO going back. My target is below 3,000 on the Dow, buckle-up, the ride has just got started. God Bless and stay safe.