US market sell-off: Nasdaq enters correction zone, Dow falls 400 points as trade policy flip-flop continues

US markets gave up most of Wednesday’s gains and some more as flip-flops over Donald Trump’s trade policy continued, leading to extreme volatility on Wall Street.The tech-heavy Nasdaq fell 2.6%, officially closing in correction territory, which means a 10% fall from the peak. The Dow, which at one point was down nearly 600 points, ended 430 points lower, and the S&P 500 fell 1.8%.

With this fall, the Nasdaq is down 4% this week so far, while the Dow and S&P 500 are down 2.9% and 3.6% respectively, putting the indices on course for their worst week since September 2024.
After Donald Trump provided a one-month exemption from tariffs to automakers that sell cars in compliance with the US-Mexico-Canada agreement, a similar relief was announced on Thursday towards more Canadian and Mexican products compliant with the agreement. The news, however, failed to enthuse investors, as it did on Wednesday.Just 24 hours ahead of the US payrolls report, data showed jobless claims fell, offering some relief after other figures pointed to a worsening labor-market. The employment print is expected to show a pick in job growth.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent rejected the idea that tariff hikes will ignite a new wave of inflation. Separately, Federal Reserve Governor Christopher Waller repeated his assessment that the impact on prices from tariffs likely won’t be significant. While he wouldn’t support lowering rates in March, Waller sees room to cut two, or possibly three, times this year.

The yield on 10-year Treasuries rose one basis point to 4.29% A dollar gauge dropped 0.1%.Low-volatility stocks are outperforming the overall market and living up to expectations of doing well when things sour. After two underwhelming years, it has become the best-performing investment theme in 2025, among 13 tracked by Bloomberg Intelligence.

While the S&P 500 sinks from a record, two of the largest low-volatility exchange-traded funds — the Invesco S&P 500 Low-Volatility ETF (SPLV) and the MSCI USA Min-Vol Factor ETF (USMV) — are clocking their best relative performances in a few years.

All that is happening as traders gear up for Friday’s jobs data.

Payrolls rose by 160,000 in February, a slight improvement from the 143,000 increase a month earlier yet softer than during the final months of 2024, according to the median projection of economists surveyed by Bloomberg. The unemployment rate is seen holding at 4%.

A survey conducted by 22V Research shows 84% of the investors we polled are watching payrolls closer than normal. Some 53% of survey respondents think Friday’s data will be “risk-off,” 28% “risk-on” and 19% “mixed / negligible.”

(With Inputs From Agencies.)