Analyst: Trump administration's ‘bad maths’ sparks market fears

Wall Street's fear gauge soared on Thursday as investors were shocked by Trump's historic tariff hikes, Gold Finance reports. As U.S. stocks and blue chips like Apple tumbled, the VIX volatility index, also known as the ‘fear gauge,’ soared 30 per cent, on its way to its biggest one-day gain since the Federal Reserve-driven sell-off last December. ‘The market thinks it's not just bad economics, it's bad maths,’ said Michael Block, market strategist at Third Seven Capital. Brock noted that the way the Trump administration calculates reciprocal tariffs seems suspect. ‘They're ignoring every rule of classical micro- and macroeconomics. This is the policymaking equivalent of a suicide bomb.’ Liz Ann Sanders, chief investment strategist at Charles Schwab, said many investors in the past thought Trump was simply using tariffs as a negotiating tool. ‘Now the market is saying, wait a minute, this is actually happening. We should take him at his word,’ Sanders said. ‘Yesterday, we were not liberated from uncertainty,’ she said, referring to what Trump called ’liberation day.’