Stocks Fall for Fourth Straight Week

WSJ Minute Briefing

The Wall Street Journal

Business News, News

4.1 • 671 Ratings

🗓️ 20 March 2026

⏱️ 3 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Nasdaq loses 2% to close out the week. Plus: Super Micro Computer shares plummet after employees are accused of smuggling servers to China. Nexstar Media’s shares rise after closing Tegna merger. Katherine Sullivan hosts. Sign up for the WSJ's free What's News newsletter. An artificial-intelligence tool assisted in the making of this episode by creating summaries that were based on Wall Street Journal reporting and reviewed and adapted by an editor. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Nearly home.
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0:33.5	Here's your closing bell brief for Friday, March 20th. I'm Catherine Sullivan for the Wall Street
0:39.1	Journal. U.S. stocks fell sharply today as geopolitical tensions in the Middle East accelerated
0:45.1	a market sell-off. The NASDAQ led the declines with a drop of 2%. The S&P 500 was down 1.5%
0:52.8	and the Dow was down 1%.
0:55.1	All three major indexes finished lower for the fourth straight week.
0:59.7	Investors reacted to the news that the U.S. is sending additional Marines to the Mide East.
1:04.3	Rising oil prices and higher treasury yields also weighed on investor sentiment.
1:08.8	Traders are now pricing in a higher chance of a Federal Reserve
1:11.8	interest rate hike by October. Among individual companies, super microcomputer shares plunged 33%.
1:19.7	The company placed two employees on leave following an alleged scheme to divert servers to China
1:25.0	in violation of U.S. export control laws. Next, our media shares
1:29.5	rose nearly 2% after closing a $6.2 billion merger with rival television station owner, Tegna.
1:36.8	Shares of FedEx gained less than 1%. The shipping giant raised its financial outlook,
1:42.4	following a rise in quarterly revenue.
1:44.9	And Scholastic shares jumped nearly 9% after the publishing house announced a $200 million stock
	...

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