Trump's Amazon Tweets Denting His Stock Market Bragging Rights
Trump has long bragged how his presidency has been a boon to the stock market. His attacks on Amazon undermine that.
(Bloomberg) -- Donald Trump has long bragged how his presidency has been a boon to the stock market. His recent attacks on Amazon.com Inc. are undermining that position.
The S&P 500 plunged more than 2.5 percent Monday, headed for the worst start to a second quarter since the Great Depression. That’s a superlative Trump probably wouldn’t like, and Amazon has a big hand in it.
The online retailer was the biggest drag on the equity benchmark Monday, a position its held for a week as it plunged 12 percent since Axios reported that the president was “obsessed” with regulating the company. That wiped about $75 billion from Amazon’s market capitalization.
Taking that big of a bite out of a company the size of Amazon can’t help but hurt the broader market. Amazon alone has wipe almost 10 points off the S&P 500 -- it’s the fourth-biggest issue in the index at 2.5 percent. The hit is more than double the next biggest drag on the equity benchmark, which has fallen more than 3 percent in that time and now sits in correction territory.
Trump has unleashed a barrage of tweets accusing Amazon of not paying enough in taxes and underpaying the U.S. Postal Service.
The stock market has hit turbulence before with the president suffering few political consequences. In October, he even took a victory lap for sending health-care shares into a tailspin.
“Heath insurance stocks, which have gone through the roof during the ObamaCare years, plunged yesterday after I ended their Dems windfall!” Trump tweeted.
--With assistance from Lu Wang
To contact the reporter on this story: Jeremy Herron in New York at jherron8@bloomberg.net.
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Jeremy Herron at jherron8@bloomberg.net, Andrew Dunn, Joanna Ossinger
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