US Stock Market Overview – Trump Boast Second Worst Stock Market Performance in 40-years

Stock prices tumbled again on Thursday despite the Fed announcing nearly 1.5-trillion in liquidity funding that initially buoyed stock prices mid-day. US yields edged lower but closed well off the lows of the day which is a good sign. Gold prices tumbled and the dollar surged as the ECB also left rates unchanged reporting that they would increase their asset purchases. Riskier assets continued to tumble as the coronavirus made its way through the United States. This week has been a bloodbath for stocks globally. All sectors in the S&P 500 index were negative led down by energy shares which tumbled another 13%. Health care was the best performing sector down 7.3%. The energy sectors was driven lower by crude oil prices dropped more than 5% but did not take out the most recent lows.

Trump Owns the Second Worst Stock Market Performance in 40-years

The stock market performance since President Trump has been in office has been the second-worst performance by a President behind only George W Bush. Excluding dividends, using the Dow Jones Industrial average, President Trump has experienced returns since he has been in office of 9%. That compares to President Clinton who experiences the best performance at the same time in his first term at 68%, and President Obama who experience returns of 65% at the same time in this first term.

Leisure and Hotel Stocks Were Hammered

Hotel operators were hammered falling nearly 10%. Events across the US continued to be canceled. On the heels of the NBA suspending the season, the NHL and MLS suspended play indefinitely. Surprisingly the Labor Department reported a larger than expected drop in jobless claims.

The Fed Injects Liquidity

The Federal Reserve announced on Thursday that the central bank would inject more than $1.5 trillion of liquidity into the market. The Fed said it had made the changes for short-term funding markets following instructions from Chairman Jerome Powell.