S&P 500 Tumbles Into Bear Market for First Time Since March 2020
- Equities benchmark closes down 22% from January record high
- Prospect of bolder Fed hikes raise concerns on growth outlook
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The S&P 500 Index sank into a bear market on Monday with investors fearing that the Federal Reserve will need to hike interest rates more aggressively to fight inflation, even at the risk of sending the US economy into recession.
The broad equities benchmark closed down 3.9%, with all 11 major industry groups declining more than 2%. The index has now fallen 22% from its Jan. 3 peak, meeting the technical definition of a bear market for the first time since the onset of the pandemic in March 2020.