The Nasdaq Composite returned to correction territory on Thursday as stocks slumped in the wake of worries about the Federal Reserve raising interest rates as early as June. The slide for the tech-heavy index follows steady declines over the past month, that saw it decline 5.5% since April 18. A correction is defined traditionally by a drop of 10% or more from a recent peak. Some marketwatchers note that the index never left the correction territory because it failed to top its previous record high. The Nasdaq, which has been the biggest laggard of the the three major stock-market benchmarks, was most recently down 50 points, or 1%, to 4,689.51, down 10.2% from its peak of 5,218.85, set July 20, 2015. The index’s weakness is led by steep pullbacks in Apple, Inc. , which has dropped 28% over the past 12 months and Netflix, Inc. which fell 23% since the start of the year. Sharp selloffs in biotechnology stocks, which declined 29% over the past year, contributed to the Nasdaq Composite’s ugly slump.
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