Small-cap benchmark Russell 2000 becomes first major U.S. stock measure to enter bear market
Source: CNBC
Published Thu, Apr 3 2025 12:45 PM EDT | Updated 27 Min Ago
Small-cap stocks, which were once thought to be primary beneficiaries of President Donald Trumps policies, entered bear market territory on Thursday after a massive stock market rout that followed the administrations sweeping and aggressive tariff rollout.
The Russell 2000 Index was down more than 5% on Thursday, bringing its losses from its November 25 record close to about 21%. On Wall Street, a 10% pullback is considered a correction, but a 20% decline is a bear market. The S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite are both in correction territory, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average is just below that mark.
Theyre getting hit because the economy is softening. Thats going to hurt profits, Keith Lerner, co-chief investment officer at Truist, told CNBC. On the other side, theyre still paying high levels of interest payments on debt because they have more of this floating-rate debt. Theyre getting squeezed on both sides, he said.
This is a sharp reversal from the gains seen in the trading days following Novembers election, with small caps viewed as beneficiaries from deregulation, lower tax rates and even tariffs since the group has fewer multinationals than large cap stocks.
Read more: https://www.cnbc.com/2025/04/03/small-cap-benchmark-russell-2000-becomes-first-major-us-stock-measure-to-enter-bear-market.html
Note this as FYI from the excerpt -
On Dec. 4, 2024 - The Dow closes above 45,000 for the first time. It may be time to rethink what makes a milestone.
So the intra-day low so far today (40,621) had the Dow a bit more than 100 points above a correction (which would need to be 40,513 or below).

IronLionZion
(48,284 posts)Lots of companies are feeling the squeeze and will pass that on to their employees and customers and shareholders.
Javaman
(63,498 posts)the orange asshole and edolf claimed there will be pain before the ultimate payoff.
we get the pain, the billionaires get the payoff.
but now that appears to be that everyone will get the pain with no payoff.
I'm oddly okay with that, if only it wakes up some of the truly epically stupid fucks on the right wing
Bengus81
(8,533 posts)Trump took office. And....Jan 21st to April 3rd are a mere 52 trading days. That's a shocking drop in that amount of trading days.
BumRushDaShow
(150,039 posts)
Which would just tap "correction" territory for the Dow based on its high on Dec. 4, 2024 -
The Dow closes above 45,000 for the first time. It may be time to rethink what makes a milestone.
The Dow DJIA -0.03% finished with a gain of around 309 points, or 0.7%, to end near 45,014 on Wednesday, according to preliminary figures.
(snip)
Bengus81
(8,533 posts)then it moved back up into the -1,679 range to close.