The Dow on Tuesday fell 425 points (1.73%) and the Nasdaq was off 121 points (1.7%). But it could have been worse, as the Dow at one point was down more than 600.
Three primary drivers for the tumble:
- 10-year Treasury yields hit 3% for the first time since 2014, which could cause some investors to take money out of stocks and put it into bonds.
- Big tech carnage driven by Wall Street analysts lowering Google profit estimates. The so-called FANG stocks (Facebook, Amazon, Netflix and Google) were each down and lost a combined $84 billion in market value.
- Caterpillar CFO Bradley Halverson told analysts that Q1 would be "the high watermark for the year." Caterpillar easily beat quarterly earnings estimates, but still finished down more than 6%.