One of the year’s hottest trades in stocks is suffering a huge market-value loss, due to angst around earnings.
Led by an earnings-driven sell-off at Alphabet Inc., the so-call FAANG group of major technology and internet stocks is on track to lose more than $100 billion in combined capitalization. The five stocks -- Facebook Inc., Amazon.com Inc., Apple Inc., Netflix Inc. and Google’s parent company -- are on pace for their second-biggest drop this year by this measure, according to Bloomberg data.
The lion’s share came from Alphabet, which dropped 8.3 percent after its revenue missed analyst forecasts. That decline represents $68.3 billion erased from its market cap.
Much of the remainder came from Apple, where a 2.1 percent drop resulted in nearly $20 billion wiped out. The decline came ahead of Apple’s own results, due after the market closes. When the FAANGs last saw $100 billion erased from their valuations, it was after Apple cut its outlook in January, which wiped almost $70 billion from the iPhone maker’s valuation.
Among the other names, Amazon fell as much as 1.6 percent, which cut about $15 billion from its market cap, while Facebook’s 0.4 percent decline resulted in $2.3 billion in lost value. Netflix rose a fraction, slightly offsetting the others with $300 million in added value.
While the combined loss is dramatic, it is mostly a reflection of how big these names have become. The group never lost a combined $100 billion in valuation before 2018. Even after the decline, Alphabet’s current valuation is about $824 billion. Both Apple and Amazon have traded with valuations over $1 trillion in the past year.
Investors have flocked to the group in recent years, betting their industry dominance will translate to some of the fastest rates of growth in the market. Apple shares have rallied 28 percent this year while an index tracking the other four is up 32 percent, both beating the the S&P 500.
This story provided by Bloomberg News.