‘Unstoppable until they aren’t’: are tech market losses signs of a bust?

Jeff Bezos knew this day was coming. Back in April the Amazon boss warned of an impending market slowdown, tweeting that the epic tech boom experienced during the last two years could not last for ever.

"Markets teach," Bezos added. "The lessons can be painful."

For years the tech industry has led the stock market with bust-out profits, fueled by a pandemic that moved much of the world online. Now all that has changed, with trillions in market value lost in recent weeks. Once-hot startups are being ditched by investors, and even the tech giants seen as stable investments have faltered.

Apple is no longer the most valuable company in the world, after losing $200bn in market value this week. It joins a number of other tech companies in a slump that began in late 2021, and brought the larger Nasdaq Composite down more than 13% in April - a more than 30% drop from record highs the previous year.

Meta lost a record $230bn in market value in February after a disappointing earnings report in which it revealed its Facebook platform had experienced its first ever user decline. Amazon reported its first loss since 2015 in its most recent earnings report last month. Alphabet revenue fell short in its first-quarter report. Smaller firms are also struggling, with pandemic success story Peloton seeing shares plunge 20% this week as demand for indoor exercise equipment fell.

Twitter announced in an internal memo on Thursday it was freezing new hires, and Meta did the same last week, citing an expense guidance given in its recent earnings report. Amazon said in a recent earnings call its warehouses were "overstaffed" and while it is not considering layoffs it is "working to remedy that".

Startups are seeing similar trends, with layoff tracking site Layoffs.fyi showing at least 55 tech firms have reported layoffs since the start of 2022 - compared with just 25 in the same time period of 2021.