Wall Street’s ‘fear gauge’ surges as Nasdaq heads for worst day since June

The CBOE Volatility Index, otherwise known as the VIX, or Wall Street’s “fear gauge”, surged Tuesday morning as U.S. stocks plunged in the wake of a “game-changing” August inflation report. The VIX, which is derived from movements in near-dated S&P 500 options, was up nearly 9% on the session at 26 VIX, +7.71% as U.S. stocks headed for their worst session in at least three weeks. The S&P 500 was off 126 points, or 3.1%, to trade at 3,982, as gauge was headed for its worst session since Aug. 26. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was off 860 points, or 2.7%, to 31,521. The Nasdaq Composite was off 493 points, or 4%, at 11,774, as the tech-heavy index headed for its worst day since mid-June, when markets were trading their lowest levels since late 2020. All 11 S&P 500 sectors were in the red, as were all 30 stocks on the Dow. The worst-performing sectors were communication services, consumer discretionary and information technology, all of which are heavily exposed to megacap tech stocks like Amazon.com Inc. AMZN, -5.73%, Meta Platforms Inc. META, -7.59%, Alphabet Inc. GOOG, -4.87%, Apple Inc. AAPL, -4.22% and Microsoft Inc. MSFT, -4.13%. Unprofitable tech stocks like those owned by the ARK Innovation exchange-traded fund ARKK, -6.39% were in even worse shape, with that index down nearly 7% in what’s shaping up to be its worst day since mid-June.