Technology stocks including Facebook, Microsoft and Alphabet went into free fall on Wall Street, over worries that the top-performing sector is falling out of favour and investors are looking elsewhere for cheaper opportunities.
Facebook fell 4.6 percent, on track for its worst day in nearly a year and eliminating over US$20 billion of its market value, while Microsoft, Apple and Alphabet each lost more than one percent.
For Apple, this followed a major fall of US$50 million on Friday (CDN, Monday).
It closed Monday’s trading at $150.58, down $1.31 on the day, and well below the $158.67 price the shares were going for a week previously, let along the year’s top of $164.94.
The sight of poor crowds at Apple stores worldwide on Friday, launch day for the new iPhone 8 range, may well have affected the market.
Underscoring growing concerns about a shift in investor focus, a quarter of the 68 stocks in the technology index have seen recent drops of 10 percent or more, which many on Wall Street define as a major correction.
“I think we’re seeing more of a rotation out of some hot-flying tech names into small-caps, some of the names that may well benefit from tax cuts,” said Art Hogan, chief market strategist at Wunderlich Securities in New York.
Investors dumped many other recent tech favorites including Nvidia, down 4.04 percent, and Applied Materials which lost 3.4pc. Videogame makers were also down, including Activision Blizzard and Electronic Arts, which both lost more than three percent.
