(Reuters) – Futures tracking the Nasdaq index sank 2% on Monday as the passage of a $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief package by the U.S. Senate lifted bond yields, sparked inflation concerns and pressured richly valued technology stocks.
Wall Street’s main indexes had staged a late-session rally on Friday as a much better-than-expected jobs report boosted optimism around a faster economic rebound, but market sentiment soured on Monday on fears that rising inflation would result in a sudden tapering of monetary stimulus.
Inflation worries were also fueled by a jump in Brent crude prices to above $70 per barrel, the highest since the COVID-19 pandemic began, following reports of attacks on Saudi Arabian facilities. [O/R]
The Nasdaq has now fallen for three straight weeks, with the yield-sensitive grouping of FAANG plus Tesla and Microsoft stocks losing $760 billion in value since Feb. 16.
At 4:51 a.m. ET, Nasdaq 100 e-minis were down 246.75 points, or 1.95%, Dow e-minis were down 89 points, or 0.28%, and S&P 500 e-minis were down 30.5 points, or 0.79%.
Facebook Inc, Apple Inc, Amazon.com Inc, Netflix Inc, Alphabet Inc, Tesla and Microsoft lost another 2% to 5% in early deals.
The yields on benchmark 10-year Treasuries stood near a 13-month high at 1.594%, while Wall Street’s fear gauge jumped nearly 3 points and was on course for its biggest one-day rise this month.
