FREAK OUT

Stocks Plummet as Biden Weighs Doubling Capital Gains Tax on the Rich

Major indexes tumbled as soon as news broke that Biden is planning on raising capital gains tax to as high as 39.6 percent for investors who make more than $1 million.

Stocks plummeted on Thursday after news broke of a potential tax hike on rich investors, The Wall Street Journal reports. President Biden is reportedly planning to raise capital-gains tax to as high as 39.6 percent—nearly double the current 20 percent rate—for investors who make more than $1 million. “Even though this is not a surprise—the expectation that capital gains would be taxed at a higher rate—it becomes more immediate and there’s a hitch in the market,” Quincy Krosby, of Prudential Financial, told WSJ. The S&P 500 Index, the Dow Jones Industrial Average, and the Nasdaq composite all dropped 0.9 percent. Tech stocks lost the most, with shares of Micron Technology, Twitter, and Western Digital falling more than 4 percent.