memory chipmakers<\/a>, tumbled more than 12%, dragging the rest of South Korea\u2019s stock market down with them (the two chipmaking giants make up about half of the Kospi\u2019s total market value).\n <\/p>\n\n Traders\u2019 fear isn\u2019t about anything specific, and there wasn\u2019t any obvious catalyst to lead to such enthusiastic selling.\n <\/p>\n
\n Some market analysts pointed to Google and SpaceX falling somewhat sharply Monday. But Google\u2019s 5% decline was mostly because of a high-profile AI leader defecting to Anthropic, and SpaceX has some post-IPO jitters that are typical for companies whose stocks boom right out of the gate.\n <\/p>\n
\n Other analysts suggested the markets were reacting to the likelihood that the Federal Reserve may raise interest rates later this year. But that\u2019s not exactly new information: New Fed Chairman Kevin Warsh held his first press conference last Wednesday to announce that the Fed would double down on its mission to get inflation under control \u2013 a promise that prompted a market sell-off as it interpreted Warsh\u2019s words as a pledge to raise interest rates later this year.\n <\/p>\n
\n Whatever the cause, with AI companies\u2019 sky-high valuations and incredible growth trajectories, it doesn\u2019t take much to set off investors. The Kospi is up 90% this year, so when the wind blows in an unexpected direction, it can lead traders \u2013 and, often more consequentially, trading algorithms \u2013 to head for the exits. They fear the top of the Jenga tower could tip over.\n <\/p>\n
\n The problem, as always with markets, is no one knows how high the Jenga tower goes. We could still be building the foundation.\n <\/p>\n
\n Nevertheless, the fear in South Korea spread throughout Asia. Japan\u2019s Nikkei fell 3.6% and tech behemoth Softbank sank 15%. Most other Asian indexes were down more than 1%.\n <\/p>\n
\n Those nerves appear to be returning in the United States, where tech stocks appeared headed for another rough day: Nasdaq futures were down 2.8% after sinking 1.3% Monday.\n <\/p>\n
\n Although tech stocks have been under pressure lately, they really haven\u2019t dropped all that much: The Nasdaq has fallen just 3.4% from its record high set on June 2.\n <\/p>\n
\n Futures tied to the broader S&P 500 were 1.2% lower, and the Dow was set to open about 200 points lower, or 0.3%.\n <\/p>\n
\n Stocks have been at or near record territory for most of the past couple of months. After President Donald Trump announced a ceasefire in Iran in April, the market largely moved on from the war and returned to a sharp focus on AI and the Fed\u2019s interest rate policy.\n <\/p>\n
\n Case in point: Oil prices continued to fall a little on Tuesday morning, as traders cheered apparent progress in peace negotiations.\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Summary South Korea’s stock market plunged 10% on Tuesday as tech stocks fell worldwide. US tech stocks appeared…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":721170,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[45],"tags":[182,181,507,74],"class_list":["post-721169","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-artificial-intelligence","tag-ai","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-artificialintelligence","tag-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/721169","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=721169"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/721169\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/721170"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=721169"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=721169"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=721169"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}