Trump Tariffs Wiped $10 Trillion From Stock Markets. It's 50% Of EU Economy

The stock market rout triggered by US President Donald Trump's punishing tariff wars wiped over $10 trillion off major markets across the globe. The financial destruction, historic in scale, was equivalent to just over half of the GDP of the European Union, according to a report by Bloomberg. 

After Trump announced sweeping tariffs last week, markets remained volatile for days, with stocks, bonds, and commodities fluctuating wildly due to fears of a recession and a global trade war.

American Markets Most Hit

After President Trump announced the sweeping tariffs, Wall Street was hit hard. For the first time in nearly a century, the S&P 500 saw three consecutive declines of 4 per cent, its worst performance since the end of the Second World War and rivaled by the 1987 Black Monday stock market rout.

Losses during this time surpassed damages unleashed by the 2020 Covid pandemic, the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers or the losses of 1998, according to a report by El Pais. 

Though markets were impacted globally, the US stock market bore the biggest brunt, with tech giants referred to as the "Magnificent Seven"-Apple, Google, Nvidia, Meta, Amazon, Microsoft, and Tesla-- being hit hardest. 

Per the El Pais report, "Magnificent Seven" lost staggering $1.6 trillion since last Thursday, with Apple bearing the biggest brunt and losing over half a trillion dollars, or about 16.8 per cent of its worth during this time. This was mainly because the tariffs directly impacted the company, whose devices are entirely manufactured in Asia. 

Nvidia reportedly came next, losing $385 billion, followed by Amazon, with $262 billion lost during the rout. Other than that, giants of the traditional US economy like JP Morgan, Eli Lilly, Berkshire Hathaway, Visa, Exxon Mobil, Walmart, and Bank of America also hemorrhaged more than $54 billion in three days, El Pais report said.

Impact Beyond US

Though US stocks were hardest hit, the other nations also witnessed financial losses. Saudi Arabia's state oil behemoth, Aramco, lost  $138 billion or 8 per cent of its market value in three days. European companies, though smaller in size than American ones, are not left untouched either. Companies like HSBC and Shell (UK), Siemens (Germany), LVMH (France), Total (France), SAP (Germany), Accenture (Ireland), and Novo Nordisk (Denmark) are reportedly on the list of the biggest losers. 

Asian companies, including China's Alibaba, Japan's Toyota and Mitsubishi, Taiwan's TSMC, which lost €78 billion in value in just one session (last week was partly a holiday in the country), and South Korea's Samsung lost billions of dollars in three days.

Trump Tariff Pause And Market Rebound

Days after registering little to no concern for the market bloodbath, US President Trump on Wednesday abruptly paused tariffs on most countries, sparking euphoria on global markets. However, he upped the ante on a brutal trade war with superpower rival China and raised tariffs on Beijing to 125 percent because of a "lack of respect."

After days of turmoil, stocks on Wall Street and across Asia saw huge surges in reaction to Trump's announcement that he was halting a levy hike for almost all nations for 90 days.

Meanwhile, Beijing hit back with retaliatory levies of 84 percent on US imports, which came into effect just after midday on Thursday, the latest salvo in an escalating standoff between the world's two largest economies.

Trump has denied that he backtracked on the tariffs, telling reporters that "you have to be flexible."

He said he had been watching the "very tricky" state of the crucial US bonds market before his decision.

"I saw last night where people were getting a little queasy," he said, as US bond yields rose during the stocks sell-off -- a major economic red light as American sovereign government debt is normally seen as a safe haven for investors in troubled times.

Trump also predicted that trade deals will be made with all countries, including China, which has for now refused to roll back retaliatory tariffs on US goods.