Key foreign stock markets continued their slide after opening on Friday morning as the shockwaves of President Donald Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariffs continued to reverberate around the globe.
Japan’s Nikkei index lost 3.5% on Friday, while the broader Japanese Topix index fell 4.45%.
In South Korea, the KOSPI index was down 1.7%, with the country grappling with both Trump’s tariffs and the news that South Korea’s Constitutional Court upheld the impeachment of President Yoon Suk Yeol.
Indian investors joined the sell-off on Friday, with the Nifty 50 and BSE Sensex indexes both falling more than 1%. India’s stock markets had previously performed better than others thanks to lower tariffs than competitors like China, Indonesia and Vietnam.
Australia’s S&P/ASX, meanwhile, continued its slide into Friday with another 2% drop, taking the index to an 8-month low.
Trump’s Wednesday announcement of tariffs on nearly all American trade partners sent U.S. and foreign markets alike into a tailspin.
All three major American stock markets closed down on Thursday, marking their worst day since June 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The NASDAQ fell 6%, the S&P 500 4.8% and the Dow Jones nearly 4%
Major companies were among those struggling. Nike plummeted 14% while Apple fell 9%. E-commerce giant Amazon slid nearly 9%.
Shares fell for each of the other so-called “Magnificent Seven,” a group of large tech firms that helped drive stock market gains in recent years.
Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, dropped nearly 9%. Chipmaker Nvidia slid 7%.
Tesla, the electric carmaker led by Trump-advisor Elon Musk, declined 5%.
Shares of U.S. retailers that depend largely on imported products also tumbled, with Dollar Tree down 13% and Five Below seeing 27% losses..
Stock futures suggested more pain for investors on Friday. NASDAQ, S&P 500 and Dow Jones futures all slid by around 0.3%.
