Usually when the share price of a well-known tech company falls more than 10% it's a perfect story for us to do a chart on. But in the last few weeks we've been overwhelmed, as almost every single day multiple major household names have been taking double-digit losses. We highlighted some of the worst affected last week — many of which have continued their slide this week.
How bad can it get?
We've combed through 50 years of daily data on the NASDAQ Composite Index, a tech-heavy index comprised of more than 2,500 companies, to get some perspective on how bad this crash has been... and how bad it could get.
So far the NASDAQ is down 29% from its previous peak. That puts it in bear market territory, but it isn't even close to the 75-80% drop that was seen during the bursting of the dotcom bubble in 2000 or the depths of the Global Financial Crisis of 2008/09. Things could get a lot worse before they get better as inflation, slowing growth and geopolitical uncertainty take their toll or this could turn out to be one of the many 20-30% drops that markets have lived through over the last 50 years, without turning into a complete capitulation.
One result of the tech slide has been that Apple has lost its crown as the world's most valuable company (coincidence that it just retired the iconic iPod...?). That honor now falls to Saudi Aramco — which like many energy companies has benefited from rising oil prices.
