Train Wreck

Monday was a train wreck from start to finish and that is all kinds of hilarious because it was just last week when folks were pouring money into U.S. stocks even as “the Trump train” continued to careen off the tracks and even as markets were palpably nervous about renewed flattening in the curve ahead of the Fed hike this week.

Flows

Things got off to a decidedly inauspicious start when Facebook moved sharply lower in the premarket just as Trump turned on Fox & Friends. And sadly, that is not a joke – those two things happened simultaneously.

.@seanhannity on @foxandfriends now! Great! 8:18 A.M.

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 19, 2018

Yes, “great!”

lol. “great”

Sean Hannity on Fox & Friends!!! How any good President starts their week

throw in a nasty egg mcmuffin in bed and you’re all set! https://t.co/eSYrWCDfd3

— Walter White (@heisenbergrpt) March 19, 2018

Fast forward 45 minutes (give or take) and we got this:

A total WITCH HUNT with massive conflicts of interest!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 19, 2018

So that set the stage and it was all downhill from there. Futures tell the story – things started to go to shit around the European open and it never got any better.

Facebook was off the lows but it was still a truly horrible day:

This was the worst day for the Nasdaq 100 since the February 8 carnage and this is five straight days of losses:

NDX

That’s especially unfortunate considering that, as Bloomberg noted this morning, “investors poured $3.3 billion into the PowerShares QQQ Trust Series last week in the biggest weekly inflow since Oct. 27, 2000, when traders put ~$6.8 billion into the fund.”

“Just buy the damn robots” – or just buy SPY – whichever:

Robtos