White House Plays Down Stock Market's Bad Day

As outlets call attention to Trump's previous claims of credit for roaring market
By John Johnson,  Newser Staff
Posted Feb 5, 2018 6:57 PM CST
White House Plays Down Stock Market's Bad Day
President Trump and first lady Melania Trump walk from Marine One to the White House Monday, Feb. 5, 2018, as they return from Ohio.   (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

President Trump himself hasn't addressed Monday's miserable day for the stock market, but two White House officials made a point to downplay the trouble and emphasize perspective. "Look markets do fluctuate," said deputy White House press secretary Raj Shah. "But the fundamentals of this economy are very strong." Press chief Sarah Huckabee Sanders said similarly that the "president's focus is on our long-term economic fundamentals, which remain exceptionally strong." As many outlets are now pointing out, Trump has repeatedly boasted of the booming stock market. In his recent State of the Union address, for example, he spoke of it smashing "one record after the other," notes USA Today, which rounds up several tweets from Trump with a similar sentiment.

Despite Monday's 1,175-point loss, the Dow is still up 23% since Trump took office, reports Business Insider. But the rough day illustrates the danger of the president taking too much credit for the market's performance, notes Politico. “This is a risk that the president clearly set himself up for,” Charles Gabriel of Capital Alpha Partners tells the news site. “Until now, Trump’s had kind of a free ride in this market and taken so much credit for it, even though so much of it was due to easy-money policies from Janet Yellen and the Fed." Monday may have seen the biggest single-day point loss in the Dow's history, but in terms of percentage, the 4.46% loss is well below the 7% single-day drop of Sept. 29, 2008.

(More stock market stories.)

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