Investing

The Nasdaq (QQQ) Meltdown Is Ruining Retirements and Is A Price Americans Don't Want to Pay

Austin Smith

Published: March 13, 2025 12:04 pm

Last Updated: March 13, 2025 12:06 pm

24/7 Wall St. Key Points:

• The Nasdaq is down 4%, with Tesla (NASDAQ: TSLA) dropping 15%, marking a long-anticipated correction after an unusually extended 320-day rally.
• The S&P 500’s (VOO) rapid gains over the past two years, driven by excessive optimism in stocks like NVIDIA (NASDAQ: NVDA), have left the market overvalued, leading to the current sharp downturn.
• The 10-year Treasury yield has dropped 60 basis points since January, which may push interest rates lower, potentially supporting the economy but also signaling economic weakness.
• Your future is too important to leave to chance. See if you’re on track for retirement by taking this simple quiz and matching with a fiduciary financial advisor serving your area. It only takes a moment, and is totally free. Click here to begin. (sponsor)

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Transcript:

[00:00:04] Doug McIntyre: We have a massive, sell off today. The Nasdaq’s down 4%, I just looked, Tesla’s down 15%. I mean, that’s, that’s a lot in one day. That is a lot. Now, it’s been a while since the correction, hasn’t it?

[00:00:21] Lee Jackson: It has been, and according to, I got this from LPL, which is a big, kind of a smaller brokerage firm.

[00:00:27] Lee Jackson: They had done some research from Ned Davis, who’s a smart guy. And typically, we have a 10 percent correction about every 117 days. The problem is, although we’re knocking on the door of one right now, it’s been 320 days since we’ve had one that is that size. And so you knew it was coming. You knew it was coming.

[00:00:50] Lee Jackson: And it was just a question of what would tip the scales? Would it be the tariff stuff? Would it be the doge stuff? what would it be? And once the S&P 500 broke  5700, it’s got a ways to go maybe still.

[00:01:05] Doug McIntyre: I don’t think if you’re the president, I don’t care who’s the president, if you’re the president and you, you don’t say no, there’s not going to be a recession on my watch, maybe that’s the price we may have to pay in the economy.

[00:01:19] Doug McIntyre: It’s like people say, Hey, look, maybe you all want to pay that price for a changed economy or a changed America. Don’t, I do not want to see my retirement funds. Knocked down by 20 percent while you guys monkey around with the government.

[00:01:34] Lee Jackson: Yeah, and and I think that’s what’s starting to bug some people and the reality is You know, they’re right about all this stuff.

[00:01:42] Lee Jackson: We get screwed by other countries on tariffs and you know The government’s huge waste, but you can’t do it all in 30 days or a week or whatever

[00:01:52] Doug McIntyre: There are a lot of signs. There were signs before Trump had the interview with Maria Bartoloma about the market going down. It just seems to me that even if we were going to go along at a 2 percent or 3 percent GDP improvement, that the stock market was just too rich, particularly things like NVIDIA, these things have been driven up so much.

[00:02:15] Doug McIntyre: It wasn’t, it wasn’t supportable.

[00:02:17] Lee Jackson: Yeah, I mean, again, the stock market in the last two years in 23 and 24, the S&P 500 was up 20%. 4 percent like each year. I mean, that’s a gigantic gain and all of these other versus the typical, 10 percent per year gain that the S&P does got. And it just got so rich and they just kept feeding the fire, kept feeding the fire.

[00:02:43] Lee Jackson: And then of course, nobody says there’s probably going to be any trouble down the road. So yeah, it was very, very, very overbought and that’s why it’s going down so fast.

[00:02:53] Doug McIntyre: Yeah, so some of the things I think people could look for out of this is one is that people can probably look for, interest rates going down maybe faster than they would have otherwise.

[00:03:05] Doug McIntyre: That’s a sort of mixed blessing. It’s going to be, a mortgage is going to be less expensive. Oh yeah. It’s being done in the name of keeping the economy out of the tank.

[00:03:16] Lee Jackson: Well, yeah, absolutely. And the yield on the 10 year note has dropped 60 basis points since late January. That’s huge. It went from like a 480 down to like a 420, and it’s like below that today.

[00:03:33] Lee Jackson: And that in itself is helpful. I mean the bond market will somehow heal itself because all lowering Fed funds does is affect short rates It doesn’t affect 10 year and 20 year and 30 year treasury rates. And really it’s kind of what treasury secretary was looking for for the yield on the 10 year to come down.