Tech gets slammed

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June 29, 2017

Tech stocks got slammed on Thursday as all three major indices finished in the red.

Tech companies in the S&P 500 dropped by as much 2.7%, and the Nasdaq was down by as much as 2.3%.

First up, the scoreboard:

Dow: 21,287.03, -167.58, (-0.78%)
S&P 500: 2,419.70, -20.99, (-0.86%)
Nasdaq: 6,144.35, -90.06, (-1.44%)
US 10-year yield: 2.268%, +0.045
WTI crude: $44.87, +0.13, +0.29%

1. Tech gets slammed. FANG stocks — Facebook, Apple, Netflix and Google — each slipped more than 1.7%, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq 100 index fell 2% to its lowest level since mid-May. Investors are growing increasingly wary of the space as they rotate out of so-called growth stocks amid monetary policy tightening from the Federal Reserve.

2. GDP beat estimates as consumers spent more. Gross domestic product, the value of everything produced in America, increased by 1.4%, a third estimate released Thursday showed. Consumer spending, the largest part of the economy, and exports were revised higher, though the broader picture of economic growth remained the same. The US economy enters its ninth year of expansion in July.

3. Blue Apron went nowhere on its first day trading. The stock traded up to $11 after debuting at $10, and ended the higher by just $0.01 at $10.01. The company went public Thursday in the shadow of the recent Amazon-Whole Foods news.

4. CBO says Congress has until mid-October to raise the debt ceiling and avoid an economic disaster. Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin has encouraged Congress to raise the limit before the legislative body leaves for its August recess.

5. A top trader at a $12.6 billion hedge fund is going it alone with $200 million from his boss. Giles Coppel, a top trader in Brevan Howard's New York office, is prepping his own hedge fund, people familiar with the matter told Business Insider. Brevan Howard is backing Coppel with $200 million, the people said.

6. Fred's crashed after its plan to buy nearly 1,000 Rite Aid stores was terminated. Walgreens and Rite Aid on Thursday said they scrapped their $17.2 billion merger, following scrutiny from US antitrust regulators. This sent shockwaves to Fred's, the pharmacy chain that had expected to buy nearly 1,000 stores from Rite Aid. Fred's shares cratered by as much as 24% in early trading.

7. Initial jobless claims unexpectedly ticked up. Claims, which count the number of people who applied for unemployment insurance for the first time, rose by 2,000 to 244,000. Economists forecast that claims would dip to 240,000.

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