The Dow Closed Below 20,000 For The First Time In Over 3 Years

The stock market had another very rough day on Wednesday due to concerns about the coronavirus and its impact on the economy. While the market tried a few times to rally during the session, the Dow fell 1,338 points or 6.3% to 19,899 (the first time it has closed below 20,000 since February 2, 2017), the S&P 500 declined 131 points or 5.2% to 2,398 and the NASDAQ dropped 345 points or 4.7% to 6,990.

The Dow has now fallen 9,653 points or 33% since its all-time high of 29,551 on February 12, just over a month ago. Except for a rally in the last 20 minutes of the day, the Dow would have fallen below when President Trump took the oath of office on January 20, 2017 (it closed 0.8% above). At its intra-day low of 18,917 it was 4% below his inauguration and only 584 points or 3.2% above when he was elected.

Keep in mind that while the Dow has fallen 36% from its all-time high, it will have to climb the same 10,634 points or more important 56% to get back to the same value. It would not be surprising to see some dead cat bounces as the markets churn lower.

Beware of Trump touting the stock market

Everyone knows that Trump keeps an eagle eye on the stock market, and he has tweeted at least 158 times about it since he was elected according to trumptwitterarchive.com. On February 19 he sent out the tweet below when the S&P 500 hit its all-time high of 3,386.

Just five days later on February 24 he tweeted that the “Stock Market starting to look very good to me.” Unfortunately, for anyone taking his advice the Dow is down over 10,000 points or 34% and the S&P 500 is down over 1,000 points or 32%.