Tech stocks slip amid economic uncertainty, investor fears

Yahoo Finance's Allie Garfinkle joins the Live show to discuss the state of tech stocks amid economic uncertainty.

Video transcript

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AKIKO FUJITA: Well, it has been a rough quarter for tech stocks, especially getting hit, some of those high-growth names, as investors really hunker down for this higher rate environment. Here with the deeper dive, let's bring in Yahoo! Finance's Allie Garfinkle, who's been tracking all of the big names for us. Worth taking a step back to look at the damage right now?

ALLIE GARFINKLE: Yeah, absolutely, Akiko. So we're at the end of a really ugly third quarter for tech, right? We're seeing some gains today, which is nice. But the year-to-date numbers, don't look great.

I mean, one to pull out is Meta, right? Down 59% year-to-date. We're seeing hiring freezes yesterday. And their bottom line is also being roiled by Apple's privacy changes. So a lot going on over there.

But the numbers across the board don't look good either, right? You have Google also announced some job cuts, down 32% this year-to-date. You have Snap, of course, which is one of the biggest losers we've seen so far, down about 78% year-to-date. So a lot of carnage there, right?

Why? Now, why this is happening, right? Easy money is not so easy anymore. Consumer spending is slowing down. And companies have struggled to build and ship products amid a global supply chain crisis. So a lot of things going on, hitting all these-- hitting all these companies really hard.

AKIKO FUJITA: Well, and then especially some of those social media companies you mentioned. There's the Apple privacy issue. But ad dollars slowing down in a big way, which is something we've heard from companies like Snap and Meta.

So there's a lot of investors who are still putting money behind these companies, whether it's individual stocks or ETF funds. What should they be looking for to indicate some upside?

ALLIE GARFINKLE: Yeah it's a great-- it's a great question, Akiko. I mean, the thing I'm hearing from analysts is proceed with caution, number one. Wedbush analyst Dan Ives, actually was on the show earlier this week, saying, it was the most pessimistic he'd been about the sector since 2009. So that's number one.

But number two, also, there is hope on the horizon, right? It's a holiday season coming up. A great holiday season could mean a lot for companies, like Apple and Amazon. So I think that's the thing to watch out for. See how everyone fares in the holiday season, watch earnings.

AKIKO FUJITA: Well also, you know, we've heard from so many who have said, look, it really comes down to not "growth at all costs," which is a shift we've already seen for many of these companies, but also, profitability. What are the numbers tell you? And we talk about tech as a whole, but really it is about piecing these names out that have better fundamentals than others.

ALLIE GARFINKLE: Exactly. And I think we're going to see-- we're gonna know more at earnings. But I really do think that long term, people are still talking about this as a sector with a lot of opportunity. And I think-- and I think we kind of go from there.

AKIKO FUJITA: All right, Allie Garfinkle, thanks so much for that.