When one of the White House's advisors said in the afternoon that the US President Donald Trump was considering a 90-day tariff pause, the world's stock exchanges temporarily turned upwards. In Stockholm, the OMXS-index was even on plus for a brief moment.
But later, the White House announced that the information about the tariff pause was "fake news" – and the stock exchanges turned downwards again. The leading European stock exchanges in Frankfurt, London, and Paris fell between 3.8 and 4.4 percent.
Plunge in Asia
Earlier, the Asian stock exchanges had closed deeply in the red. The Hong Kong stock exchange plummeted 13.2 percent, while the Tokyo stock exchange fell 7.8 percent.
At the same time, Donald Trump again defended the tariffs. On his social media platform Truth Social, he wrote that the oil price has gone down, as have interest rates and food prices.
"THERE IS NO INFLATION", the post read.
The oil price has fallen in recent days due to the tariffs, but also because the oil cartel OPEC has decided to increase production more than expected. On Monday afternoon, a barrel of Brent oil was traded for just over 64 dollars.
Down over 12 percent this year
On the Stockholm stock exchange, all companies in the OMXS30-index, which lists the most traded shares, fell. The worst performer in OMXS30 was pharmaceutical giant Astra Zeneca, which plummeted 8.1 percent. Appliance manufacturer Electrolux and medical technology company Hexagon fell 7.0 and 6.9 percent, respectively.
The stock exchange has now fallen 12.8 percent since the turn of the year and 13.5 percent in the past week.
The krona weakened slightly against the dollar, which cost 10.08 kronor at the close of trading on Monday. One euro cost 10.99 kronor.
Corrected: In an earlier version of the text, the index figures for the major European stock exchanges were incorrect.
