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DonViejo

(60,536 posts)
Tue May 29, 2018, 03:41 PM May 2018

Dow sinks more than 500 points as Italy's political crisis triggers global sell-off

Source: The Washington Post



By Thomas Heath

May 29 at 2:50 PM

Markets plunged worldwide Tuesday as investors worried that a growing political crisis in Italy could lead to its withdrawal from the Eurozone in a replay of Britain’s vote to exit two years ago.

The Dow Jones industrial average was down more than 500 points — about 2 percent — in afternoon trading Tuesday on worries that the Italian crisis could bleed throughout the Eurozone.

The Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index, tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite and Russell 2000 all suffered losses Tuesday as the concerns in Italy spread to U.S. traders.

Investors sold out of bonds in the southern European counties and the Italian banks and stock markets were hit on worries that Italians might eventually ditch the euro. The Italian and Spanish stock markets were suffering the worst, with stock market drops in the 2.5 percent range.

Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/dow-sinks-500-points-as-italys-political-crisis-triggers-global-sell-off/2018/05/29/75003640-635d-11e8-99d2-0d678ec08c2f_story.html

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Dow sinks more than 500 points as Italy's political crisis triggers global sell-off (Original Post) DonViejo May 2018 OP
Does Wall Street do this every time tazkcmo May 2018 #1
Made even worse by the fact that Putin is interferring in their elections. Initech May 2018 #5
Bannon going over there doesn't help either. BigmanPigman May 2018 #6
Wtf...nothing to do with this, it's all about tariffs and the trade war coming beachbum bob May 2018 #2
"Trump's latest move, announced May 29, is a vow to impose tariffs of 25% on $50 billion of Chinese progree May 2018 #8
Wankers IronLionZion May 2018 #3
Yes they are turning in . Bannon is over there I read pumping up the pro exit lunasun May 2018 #4
2% is 2%. I remember when 500 was scary big. Hortensis May 2018 #7
Well, bully for you. llmart May 2018 #9
We're retirees, Ilmart, and like many others belied Hortensis May 2018 #10
I worked past retirement age too. llmart May 2018 #11
Sister. :) I agree with your middle class definition Hortensis May 2018 #13
Free cell phones! llmart May 2018 #15
We've never been materialistic either, or at least Hortensis May 2018 #17
Dow Jones dropped 251 today workinclasszero May 2018 #12
So much winning! llmart May 2018 #14
MAGA baby! workinclasszero May 2018 #18
The New Anti-EU Italy - right wing takes charge Baclava May 2018 #16

tazkcmo

(7,286 posts)
1. Does Wall Street do this every time
Tue May 29, 2018, 03:44 PM
May 2018

Italy has a political crisis? Another question, is it really a crisis if it happens all the time? Italy is famous for its government turmoil.

Initech

(99,910 posts)
5. Made even worse by the fact that Putin is interferring in their elections.
Tue May 29, 2018, 05:08 PM
May 2018

God... he is turning the world on its' ear and no one is doing anything about it.

 

beachbum bob

(10,437 posts)
2. Wtf...nothing to do with this, it's all about tariffs and the trade war coming
Tue May 29, 2018, 03:57 PM
May 2018

And the chaos of the trump admin which is a rudderless ship in a storm. It's about total lack of instability,

progree

(10,864 posts)
8. "Trump's latest move, announced May 29, is a vow to impose tariffs of 25% on $50 billion of Chinese
Tue May 29, 2018, 06:20 PM
May 2018

technology imports, beginning in mid-June."

-- Trump should golf more, 5/29/18
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/trump-should-golf-more-190600631.html
( a good recap on where we are on tariffs )

----------------------------------------------------------

Yup, I'm sure this has a lot to do with it. The media was saying, or NPR anyway, as recently as the weekend, that the trade war concerns were mostly behind us. So it was certainly a shock to me.

IronLionZion

(45,256 posts)
3. Wankers
Tue May 29, 2018, 03:59 PM
May 2018

Greece is still in the Eurozone and still in the EU. So I doubt Italy will be thrown out. Are they worried Italy will choose to leave the EU completely, like UK?

Smart mutual fund managers will be buying low, equities and bonds.

Hortensis

(58,785 posts)
7. 2% is 2%. I remember when 500 was scary big.
Tue May 29, 2018, 05:34 PM
May 2018

We don't take dividends on anything, though. Big and little losses so far all on paper, not on our travel plans.

llmart

(15,499 posts)
9. Well, bully for you.
Tue May 29, 2018, 06:26 PM
May 2018

But this hurts retirees who are living on their IRA's. The 1% never have to worry about losses but middle class Americans do.

Hortensis

(58,785 posts)
10. We're retirees, Ilmart, and like many others belied
Thu May 31, 2018, 03:37 PM
May 2018

by our possessions we're no longer middle class. We're not having to draw down our retirement savings, except for special expenses, because I still work past retirement age.

Okay? Btw, I disagree this hurts middle class retirees. So far. Even if it's happening often enough now that people have to change overseas travel plans to domestic, or continue to live with out-of-style granite in the kitchen instead of replacing it with quartz, that is not "hurting" by my book.

When it genuinely hurts, when they realize they simply can't afford to travel to attend a grandchild's regional swim championship meet, they won't be middle class any more. A definition thing.

llmart

(15,499 posts)
11. I worked past retirement age too.
Thu May 31, 2018, 04:56 PM
May 2018

I am a retiree and will be required to take an RMD in a year. Those who are already retired and over 70 and having to draw from their retirement accounts to pay bills and eat and put gas in their car, well, those are the people I'm talking about and generally socioeconomically they are classified as middle class. If they were no longer middle class than I highly doubt they'd have any savings to draw from.

I consider myself a middle class retiree. I live in a community of middle class retirees. I don't know too many of them who are jetting off to Europe every year. I haven't had a vacation in I don't know how long. I have formica. I now have to live on a fixed income and when the stock market is so volatile because of the idiot in the WH, it is worrisome.

I think you'd be surprised how they define poverty level in this country. I don't know your situation, but if you have a job you most likely are not poverty level. I worked up until January of this year and I'm 69. I had worked since I was 17 when I graduated from high school. I figured I would have to leave sometime and if I couldn't pay my bills at this age what difference would one more year make? But then again, I have spent most of my life being very frugal with simple needs.

Hortensis

(58,785 posts)
13. Sister. :) I agree with your middle class definition
Thu May 31, 2018, 05:52 PM
May 2018

and apply it to us, but it's massaged to include everyone in the middle between poor and wealthy. Lots of room for income decline and still be middle class that way.

I stopped going by mainstream economists'definitions of classes a long time ago because they just don't feel right. By economists' standards, most who of us who think we are or were middle class are not. MC used to be people who could afford servants, etc., such as a single or pair of married well-to-do professionals today. I've always felt our feelings on that are more accurate than a hoary old definition held over from a class-stratified era that's long gone. I knew what to think looking around us.

My definitions are based not on type of work (plumbers still make a lot of money) or educational level (plenty are both well to do and only semiliterate) but the lifestyle you can afford.
Everyone who has to work to sustain a less-than-wealthy lifestyle is working class. That includes those affluent professionals until they've built up a nice estate and can trade work for living handsomely on investment income.

Lower working (middle) class would be normally self sustaining at a modest level, with a little left over for emergencies, a little saving, a little pocket money, but only modest "luxuries" no one else would consider luxurious. We're now basically at that level. If a 2% drop in dividend income hurt, it would just confirm for me that the economically comfy days are over.

Middle working (middle) class, which is where I considered we used to be, sustains at a higher level, bigger houses, more expensive cars, and able to save some for retirement and/or college and still have money left over to spend on limited luxuries, that granite and its frivolous replacement 15 years later instead of vacation that year. Our home and much of its nicer furnishings were earned in those years. No way we could afford it now, and if we sold we'd downsize severely and invest the rest to pump up our income. Like many do, and we will eventually when my husband's ready.

Upper working (middle) class would be those well paid professionals, especially a few years in, taking the children skiing in the Rockies in winter and in the summer scubaing in the Caribbean and to Africa just to see wild animals while they're still there. I use those examples because that's my daughter's plan this year, but they're booming these days.

And if you don't have to work to live an upper middle class lifestyle, you're wealthy by my standards, even if Steven Mnuchin regards all of us as peasants trying to claim being "entitled" to sponge off the real wealthy.

Anyway, whatever I call myself, our savings are not enough to maintain our previous lifestyle, price inflation a significant part of it.

hi:

llmart

(15,499 posts)
15. Free cell phones!
Thu May 31, 2018, 07:15 PM
May 2018

I worked with a woman who constantly would criticize the ads for free cell phones for those who qualified (supposedly the poor). One day I got so sick of this same old story that I said to her, "Do you have any idea how low your income has to be before you qualify for one of those cell phones?" i had gone online just because I tend to be a curious person and will never state anything as a fact unless 99.9% sure I'm correct. I put in my monthly income from a very small pension and Social Security (I left out the money I was making at the part time job) and still I didn't qualify for a free cell phone. I think you had to have total income of about $12,000. I told her that and said, "I can't even imagine living on $12,000 and the government says you're too rich for one of these free phones." Shut her up quickly, but she was one of those Republicans who couldn't stand for anyone to have anything.

She did the same with "Obamacare" always putting it down with her Faux News talking points. Because I wasn't one to bring politics to work with me, I usually didn't engage her too much, but this time I said to her, "Before I got this job and before I was Medicare eligible I had to get insurance through the marketplace and I'm really glad it was there for me." She didn't know what to say. I wasn't hostile or antagonistic about it and I think something sunk in but only for a minute and then I'm sure she went back to her old values.

I have always said that my most valued trait that has served me well over my lifetime was not being materialistic. People think I'm odd, especially since I'm a woman and I always tell people I despise shopping, which I do. My values come from being more concerned about how conspicuous consumption affects our environment.

Hortensis

(58,785 posts)
17. We've never been materialistic either, or at least
Thu May 31, 2018, 08:34 PM
May 2018

focused on having money (books are "material" I suppose, and I have a bunch), which is a big part of why we don't have more now. We could have done better without too much effort, but it's not where our interests were, either of us.

I remember the noise over the free cell phones, also the whomped up outrage that people could have refrigerators and microwaves and still dare to call themselves poor. We have the same situations with talking with conservatives these days. Like bouncing ping-pong balls off a wall.

But a few times I've admitted to someone our age not understanding why their leaders plan to dismantle Medicare and express worry about how, now that I'm not getting insurance through work, we'll pay for medical care when that's shut down. It's always a new idea, of course, and I meanly hope I may have introduced a prick of uncertainty about their own future that won't just disappear.

On the other side, we have friends, lifelong small farmers here in rural Georgia, whose principles simply will not allow them to sign up for subsidized exchange insurance. Using their retirement savings for high-priced private insurance is breaking them, and I felt obliged to at least let her know what we were paying. So I told her that, and that I respected their principles, which I did, but that we had paid taxes freely into the federal system all our working lives, without ever voting for a tax break while needs weren't met (true) and that our principles allowed us to sign up for this new program created by us for us. Then I told her. This was a couple years ago. That's all I could do.

Have a nice evening, Ilmart.

 

Baclava

(12,047 posts)
16. The New Anti-EU Italy - right wing takes charge
Thu May 31, 2018, 07:17 PM
May 2018

Italy reaches a deal on a new government, ending a crisis that rattled global markets

ROME — Italy appeared Thursday to step back from the brink of a continent-rattling political crisis , with officials agreeing to a deal that averts the threat of fresh elections and puts two populist parties in charge of the euro zone’s third-largest economy.

The anti-establishment Five Star Movement and the far-right League will govern together, forming the first purely populist coalition to lead a core Western European country since the creation of the European Union. And they will get their preferred prime minister, the little-known law professor Giuseppe Conte.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/italian-parties-reach-deal-on-a-new-government-ending-a-political-crisis-that-had-rattled-global-markets/2018/05/31/b03c38de-64fd-11e8-81ca-bb14593acaa6_story.html?utm_term=.cbc672e38584

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