Are markets heading for another slump?

After an impressive run in 2012 so far, stock markets have just suffered their first significant stumble. Is it just a normal pullback, or the start of something bigger? John Stepek investigates.

So what spooked markets yesterday? In Britain, the FTSE 200 closed down nearly 2%, while in the US, the S&P 500 was similarly whacked.

There may be nothing to it. Markets have had a very impressive run over the past few months. Yesterday was the first day this year that the S&P 500 had fallen by more than 1%.

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John Stepek

John Stepek is a senior reporter at Bloomberg News and a former editor of MoneyWeek magazine. He graduated from Strathclyde University with a degree in psychology in 1996 and has always been fascinated by the gap between the way the market works in theory and the way it works in practice, and by how our deep-rooted instincts work against our best interests as investors.

He started out in journalism by writing articles about the specific business challenges facing family firms. In 2003, he took a job on the finance desk of Teletext, where he spent two years covering the markets and breaking financial news.

His work has been published in Families in Business, Shares magazine, Spear's Magazine, The Sunday Times, and The Spectator among others. He has also appeared as an expert commentator on BBC Radio 4's Today programme, BBC Radio Scotland, Newsnight, Daily Politics and Bloomberg. His first book, on contrarian investing, The Sceptical Investor, was released in March 2019. You can follow John on Twitter at @john_stepek.