Investing.com – Stocks tumbled Friday as the U.S.-China trade dispute intensified and President Donald Trump announced he was ordering U.S. companies with China facilities to move them somewhere else.
The S&P 500 fell 2.59%. The Dow was off nearly 2.37X%, and the Nasdaq Composite was down 3.0%. The Nasdaq 100, heavily influenced by some of the biggest names in technology, dropped about 3.15%.
The losses were the third-worst daily losses for the indexes this month and this year.
The Dow had fallen as many as 745 points during the session.
Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) (NASDAQ:AAPL), whose growth is tied to growth in its China business, was off more than 4.6%. Most big-tech stocks were off by similar amounts. Advanced Micro Devices (NASDAQ:AMD) (NASDAQ:AMD) fell about 7.4%.
The Trump order, announced on Twitter and whose enforceability is questionable, came after China announced it would raise tariffs on a variety of U.S. products, including cars and farm products. The president suggested U.S. manufacturers move their Chinese operations elsewhere or bring jobs back to the United States.
The order also came after Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell told a Jackson Hole, Wyo., conference that the Fed stood ready to provide stimulus to the economy if needed. Trump didn't like the speech because it did not signal an aggressive interest-rate cut at the Fed's next meeting in September.
In a tweet, Trump asked, "My only question is, who is our biggest enemy, Jay Powell or Chairman Xi?” Chairman Xi being Xi Jinping, the Chinese president.
The 10-Year Treasury yield fell to 1.52%, down from 1.61% on Thursday. The spread between the 10-year note yield and the yield on the 2-year Treasury note widened to 0.13 basis points.