Transportation stocks slide during ‘wild’ Wall Street session

The Dow Jones Transportation Average (DJTA) slipped 3.2 percent to 10,350.41 on Monday and continued to fall in early morning trading on Tuesday after reaching an all time high in mid-January.    Bellwether U.S. transportation and logistics stocks continued to slide yesterday amid what analysts are referring to as a “wild” Wall Street trading session.
   The Dow Jones Transportation Average (DJTA), a U.S. stock market index that calculates the running average of the share prices of 20 major shipping companies, closed at 10,350.41 on Monday, Feb. 5, down 3.2 percent from the pervious close, and continued to fall in early morning trading on Tuesday.
   The decline came as the overall Dow Jones Industrial Average, which had been on an historic tear since the election of U.S. President Donald Trump, suddenly plummeted 1,600 points before rebounding slightly to close the day down 1,175.21 points (4.6 percent) at 24, 345.75.
   According to stock market analysts and media outlets, the 1,175-point decline was the largest single-day decrease ever for the Dow in terms of points, surpassing the previous record of 778 points dropped in one session during the 2008 financial crisis.
   However, analysts were quick to dispel talks of a “crash,” saying there is little reason to panic over even an historic drop given that the stock market has been growing steadily since November 2016. Instead, they used terms like “unwinding” and “pull-back” to describe the activity.
   The overall Dow had gained 45 percent leading up to its record closing high of 26,616.71 on Jan. 26, 2018.
   And the DJTA began its ascent in January 2016 after hitting a two-year low of 6,689.06, rising a whopping 70 percent to its peak of 11,373.78 on Jan. 12, 2018.
   The situation on Wall Street certainly bears watching though, as both the Dow and the DJTA serve as leading indicators for the overall health of the U.S. and – to a lesser extent – global economies.
   At the time of writing, the DJTA stood at 10,377.62, up 27.21 points (0.26 percent) from yesterday’s close.