Stocks pulled back Tuesday as a sell-off that has engulfed Wall Street in recent weeks resumed after two straight winning sessions.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 260.32 points, or 0.62%, closing at 41,581.31. The S&P 500 shed 1.07%, ending at 5,614.66. The broad market index concluded the day 8.6% off its closing high reached in February, bringing it near correction territory. The Nasdaq Composite dropped 1.71% and settled at 17,504.12.

Tesla, one of the stocks hardest hit during the market's recent correction, was down yet again on Tuesday. The stock fell more than 5% after RBC Capital Markets lowered its price target on the electric vehicle name, citing rising competition in the EV space. It has declined more than 36% over the past month.

The EV maker wasn't the only tech name down during the session. Shares of Palantir and Nvidia dropped nearly 4% and more than 3%, respectively. The Technology Select Sector SPDR Fund (XLK) was also down more than 1%.

"It does appear the market really does want to rotate into things that haven't worked as well [and] out of things that did work well for the last couple of years, so that may be just what all this is about," said Rhys Williams, chief investment officer at Wayve Capital.

"The markets are going to remain choppy up until whatever decision is made on April 2," Williams also said, referring to President Donald Trump's impending tariff exemption deadline on some imports from Canada and Mexico.

The declines follow a second-straight winning session on Wall Street. That marked a turn after several tough weeks on Wall Street as some soft economic data and Trump's on-again-off-again tariff policy left investors wary of the U.S.' financial health.

The S&P 500 officially entered correction territory last week, but the index made up some ground in the recovery rally seen in Friday's and Monday's sessions. Despite the recent bounce, the tech-heavy Nasdaq still sits in a correction, a term used to describe an index falling at least 10% from a recent high. The three major averages all remain down on the year, underscoring the strength of the market's pullback.

While investors continue to follow updates out of the White House, they'll turn their attention to the Federal Reserve's two-day policy meeting that kicked off Tuesday.

Traders will closely follow Wednesday afternoon's interest rate announcement and subsequent press conference with Fed Chair Jerome Powell. Fed funds futures are pricing in a 99% likelihood that the central bank holds rates steady, according to CME's FedWatch Tool.

Stocks close lower after back-to-back winning sessions

The three indexes finished in negative territory on Tuesday.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average declined 260.32 points, or 0.62%, to close at 41,581.31. Meanwhile, the S&P 500 fell 1.07% to settle at 5,614.66, and the Nasdaq Composite moved 1.71% lower to settle at 17,504.12.

— Sean Conlon

The market could ultimately fall 15% from recent high, Baird's Ross Mayfield says

Stocks could see more pullback from current trading levels, according to Ross Mayfield, an investment strategist at Baird.

"Your average nonrecession pullback or correction is in the 15% range, which is not all that different from what the average entry year drawdown is over the last 40 or 50 years anyway, so would I be surprised at all if we reenter traction territory and press toward 14% or 15%? Not at all," he said to CNBC.

As of afternoon trading, the S&P 500 has tumbled 8.6% from its recent all-time high, which it notched in late February.

"I don't think that a recession is imminent, and without more significant economic weakness, I think that's the probably the extent of it," Mayfield continued.

— Sean Conlon

Strategy to fund more bitcoin purchases with new preferred 'Strife' stock

Strategy, formerly known as MicroStrategy, plans to raise about $500 million in an offering of a new class of preferred stock known as perpetual Strife to fund more of its bitcoin purchases. It is expected to trade on the Nasdaq under the ticker STRF.

The company will offer five million shares of Strife at $100 per share. The shares will accrue a 10% annual dividend rate payable quarterly in cash beginning June 30.

Generally, preferreds have attributes shared by stocks and bonds. They trade publicly on exchanges and offer quarterly dividends. However, holders of preferreds have lower seniority than bond investors. That means if an issuer goes through liquidation, the preferred holders will rank below the bond investors, but they are above common stockholders, who tend to get wiped out.

Strategy has bought about 500 million bitcoin worth more than $40 billion, largely funded through debt and equity sales. Tuesday's news follows a plan announced last week to raise $21 billion through perpetual "Strike" (STRK) preferred stock. Unlike the similarly named Strife shares, STRK can be converted into Strategy's common stock.

— Tanaya Macheel, Darla Mercado

Investors should 'remain cautious' through March to April, Janney Montgomery Scott says

Investors should brace for more downside ahead even if there is a near-term rally in the market, according to Janney Montgomery Scott.

"We believe there may be more upside for stocks on a short-term basis, as the major benchmarks we track have yet to make key Fibonacci retracements on their charts (38.2%; 50%; with 50% being the more important one to watch)," wrote Dan Wantrobski, the firm's associate director of research, in a recent note to clients. "We remain cautious moving through the March - April time frame and believe another leg lower can materialize in the coming days/weeks."

Wantrobski noted that the S&P 500 could fall further to 5,000 or even lower to 4,650. That implies downside of nearly 12% to 18% from Monday's close.

— Sean Conlon

The market hasn't bottomed yet, Wolfe Research says

The stock market hasn't bottomed yet, with further volatility likely through May, according to Wolfe Research.

"We don't believe the market has bottomed yet, as we expect further choppy inflation and employment
data over the next few months," said Chris Senyek, chief investment strategist at Wolfe Research. "Additionally, with investors feeling significant 'tariff fatigue' we expect policy uncertainty to linger at least until May."

— Sarah Min

CNBC Pro: BofA survey shows 'bull crash'

Bank of America's Global Fund Manager Survey showed a "bull crash" this month.

The widely followed investor survey recorded the largest pullback in overall investor sentiment since March 2020. That comes as concerns about President Trump's rollout of tariffs and broader economic growth have spooked traders.

CNBC Pro subscribers can click here for the full story.

— Alex Harring

See the stocks moving midday

These are some of the stocks moving midday:

• Palantir — Shares slid 2.4% after Jefferies reiterated the defense technology stock as underperform, saying valuation remains a concern.
• Sarepta Therapeutics — The biotechnology company plunged 20% after disclosing the death of a man who was treated with its Elevidys gene therapy.
• Millrose Properties — The residential land developer popped nearly 10% after the company declared a dividend and issued fresh guidance.

See the full list here.

— Alex Harring

Nvidia shares slip more than 2% heading into GTC conference

It's getting tougher for AI darling Nvidia to impress Wall Street. Nvidia shares fell 2.3% to roughly $116 per share around midday trading ahead of the company's flagship GPU Technology Conference, or GTC, on Tuesday.

Nvidia has typically outperformed its peers during the week of the GTC for the past five years, according to a recent Wells Fargo analysis. But a rebound may not last long, as the stock's six-session win streak in March 2024 was soon followed by a double-digit pullback.

Still, the recent pullback in the stock has led to a compelling valuation, according to some analysts on Wall Street who remain bullish on the name. Nvidia shares are down nearly 4% this week and about 13% this year.

— Pia Singh

All 11 S&P sectors lower as sell-off restarts

All S&P 500 sectors were in negative territory on Tuesday as stocks reversed course from their gains in the prior two sessions.

Losses in communication services and consumer discretionary names led the declines among the sectors, with the former falling nearly 3% and the latter dropping around 2%. Information technology, utilities and industrials were behind those two sectors, each sliding more than 1%.

Those moves come as the S&P 500 was 1.2% lower in midday trading, joining the other two major averages in the red.

— Sean Conlon

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang says 'there's going to be lots of surprises' in GTC conference

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang is hyping up Nvidia's announcements ahead of the chipmaker's flagship GPU Technology Conference on Tuesday, saying there is much more investors can expect to hear about beyond AI.

"Everybody thinks they know what I'm going to talk about. They have no idea … unbelievable stuff we're going to talk about," Huang told CNBC on Tuesday as he handed out sausages outside a Denny's, where he first worked as a teenager, ahead of his keynote.

Huang added that AI will be discussed during the conference, but that "there's going to be lots of surprises."

Huang is expected to announce Nvidia's Blackwell Ultra GB300 AI chip platform scheduled to be released this fall, and its next-generation AI graphics processor Vera Rubin, targeted for a 2026 rollout. He is also expected to discuss Nvidia's advancements with AI agents, humanoid robots, autonomous vehicles and quantum computing.

Investors are watching for any updates on new customers, Blackwell sales surpassing Hopper's and any information about the software ecosystem that could keep demand alive, particularly as Nvidia shares have cratered over the past month.

Wall Street analysts remain largely bullish on the stock ahead of the conference, citing Nvidia's overall competitive advantage, but some expressed concerns about overlapping Blackwell announcements.

Read more here about analysts' expectations and how the stock could react.

— Pia Singh

Industrial production posted strong 0.7% gain in February

Factory output posted a better-than-expected showing in February as auto manufacturing ramped up, the Federal Reserve reported Tuesday.

Industrial production increased 0.7% on the month, better than the 0.3% increase in January and ahead of the Dow Jones estimate for a gain of 0.3%. Manufacturing increased 0.9%, pushed by an 8.5% surge in motor vehicles and parts.

At the same time, capacity utilization rose to 78.2%, up 0.5 percentage points from January and better than the outlook for 77.8%.

— Jeff Cox

UBS says there is more to go in stocks, buy the dip in AI

Investors should stay in the market despite the bouts of volatility, but should remain nimble, according to UBS.

"We retain our view that there is more to go in stocks, and we keep our conviction in the long-term opportunities in stocks linked to both the artificial intelligence and power and resources transformational innovations," the firm's chief investment office said in a note Monday.

UBS remains bullish on U.S. tech in the medium term, although it expects volatility to persist in the near term. Barring further tariff escalation, the equities appear to have priced in uncertainties, wrote the team, led by Ulrike Hoffmann-Burchardi.

In addition, a 10% correction in the Nasdaq Composite Index historically has proved to be a good support level and an upcoming Nvidia conference could be a catalyst to ease earnings concerns, she said.

Existing tech investors should remain invested through the volatility and investors looking to add positions should buy the dip in quality artificial intelligence stocks, it noted.

"We continue to see broad-based investment opportunities across the tech value chain, and particularly like AI infrastructure names with strong pricing power, and megacap platform and application beneficiaries," Hoffmann-Burchardi said.

— Michelle Fox

Stocks open lower after two straight winning sessions

Stocks opened in the red on Tuesday.

Shortly after the opening bell, the S&P 500 fell 0.4%, while the Nasdaq Composite shed 0.8%. The Dow Jones Industrial Average also slid 121 points, or about 0.3%.

— Sean Conlon

Import prices rose 0.4% in February, higher than forecast

Prices on U.S. imports accelerated in February as the U.S. and its trading partners engaged in a tit-for-tat tariff battle.

Import prices increased 0.4% on the month, the biggest move since April 2024 and faster than the Dow Jones forecast that the category would be unchanged. Export prices, however, were up just 0.1% as export air passenger fares tumbled 13%.

— Jeff Cox

Google agrees to buy Wiz for $32 billion

Google announced on Tuesday that it has signed a definitive agreement to acquire cloud security startup Wiz in an all-cash transaction valued at $32 billion — the largest acquisition in Google's history.

Shares were marginally lower following the deal's announcement. The stock has lagged the broader market this year, falling more than 13% compared to the S&P 500's year-to-date loss of more than 3%.

— Sean Conlon, Samantha Subin

Housing starts posted 11.2% increase in February, better than expected

New construction was stronger than expected in February as mortgage rates moved lower, the Commerce Department reported Tuesday.

Privately owned housing starts totaled a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.5 million, an 11.2% jump from January and better than the 1.38 million Dow Jones estimate, according to Census Bureau data.

Also, building permits totaled 1.46 million for the month, slightly above the forecast, though 1.2% below January. Housing completions totaled 1.59 million, a 4% drop from January.

Mortgage rates declined steadily during the month, falling about 0.3 percentage points, according to Freddie Mac.

— Jeff Cox

Stocks making the biggest moves premarket

Check out some of the companies making headlines in premarket trading:

• Ralph Lauren — The fashion stock added 2.8% following an upgrade at Goldman Sachs to buy from neutral. The bank said Ralph Lauren has limited exposure to tariffs versus its peers.
• Duolingo — The language learning application climbed 1.5% following an upgrade to outperform from Citizens JMP Securities. Analyst Andrew Boone noted that Duolingo's Max subscriptions could be a boon for the stock moving forward, and also cited an attractive valuation as a bullish catalyst.
• Peabody Energy — Shares of the coal mining company gained 4.8% after President Trump on Truth Social said he is authorizing energy production using coal.

Read the full list here.

— Brian Evans

Bessent calls the economy 'healthy,' sees no 'need' for recession

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Tuesday that while he can't "guarantee" a recession will occur, he sees underlying strength in the economy that makes a retrenchment unlikely.

On NBC's "Meet the Press," which aired Sunday, Bessent said he couldn't "guarantee" a recession wouldn't happen, a comment he said Tuesday was misconstrued and doesn't represent the optimism he has over current prospects.

"What I can guarantee you is that there is no reason we need to have a recession," he said on Fox Business' "Mornings with Maria" show. "The economy in the first quarter is doing better than the media is reporting. … So the underlying economy is healthy. There is no reason we have to have a recession."

— Jeff Cox

Barclays downgrades PepsiCo to equal weight from overweight

Barclays downgraded shares of PepsiCo to an equal weight rating from overweight on Tuesday, citing mounting pressure against the company's U.S. food business as a reason.

With the U.S. food business accounting for 30% of Pepsi's sales and 47% of its profits, analysts have been viewing Pepsi increasingly more as a U.S. packaged food company rather than a multinational snacks and beverage company, Barclays wrote.

"As such, investors have largely looked past the constructive international story that emerged in recent years, and negative sentiment has instead been fully driven by the faltering of Frito-Lay North America," analyst Lauren Lieberman added. "Therefore, the ability for PEP shares to re-rate higher is (rightly or wrongly) all about the fate of the US snacking business, and we are of the view there remains a heavy lift in order to shore up FLNA. What's more, looking past the initial rebuild of FLNA, we see less upside inherent in sales and profit growth longer term compared to our outlook a few years ago when we upgraded PEP to Overweight."

Lieberman accompanied the downgrade by lowering her price target to $156 from $168. This revised price forecast is just 3% above where shares of Pepsi closed Monday afternoon.

Pepsi's stock has slipped 12% over the past 12 months.

— Lisa Kailai Han

Baidu shares rise following release of AI models

Baidu shares rose more than 2% in the premarket on Tuesday, extending its 9% gain from the previous session.

The gains come on the heels of the Chinese tech giant releasing two new artificial intelligence models on Sunday, one of which the company claims rivals DeepSeek's R1 model.

The stock has significantly outperformed the broader market in 2025, seeing a jump of more than 21% year to date through Monday's close.

— Sean Conlon, Dylan Butts

Morgan Stanley upgrades Lucid Group to equal weight on emerging AI strategy

Morgan Stanley analyst Adam Jonas upgraded electric vehicle manufacturer Lucid Group to an equal weight rating from underweight in a Monday note, citing a potential executable artificial intelligence strategy.

Jonas left his price target for the stock unchanged at $3. This represents a nearly 39% upside from Lucid's Monday closing level of $2.16. Shares of Lucid have tumbled more than 28% this year.

But going forward, Jonas believes a new leadership team and its emerging AI strategy could boost the stock higher.

"Following the announced/ongoing changes in leadership, we believe Lucid has opportunity to execute an AI strategy leveraging strategic/sovereign partnerships within the context of the urgency to develop onshore manufacturing capacity for BEVs [battery electric vehicles] as the 'socket' for the AI 'brain,'" he wrote.

Jonas added: "We see emerging scope for Lucid's ability to play a role in the embodied AI theme as an reshored/'friend-shored' manufacturer with access to capital and strategic relationships that uniquely position Lucid to straddle geopolitical hurdles in potentially partnering with both China and the West."

— Lisa Kailai Han

Asia-Pacific markets rise as Hong Kong tech stocks rally; Baidu shares pop 12%

Asia-Pacific markets rose on Tuesday, tracking gains on Wall Street, which ticked up after U.S. retail sales data appeared to ease recession concerns.

Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index led gains in Asia, rising 2.29% in its last hour on the back of strong moves in tech giants such as Baidu, which was up 12.11% as of 3:45 p.m. local time.

Meanwhile, mainland China's CSI 300 advanced 0.27% to end the day at 4,007.72.

Japan's benchmark Nikkei 225 ended the day 1.20% higher at 37,845.42, while the broader Topix index rose 1.29% to 2,783.56.

Over in South Korea, the Kospi index closed flat at 2,612.34, while the small-cap Kosdaq added 0.27% to end at 745.54.

Australia's S&P/ASX 200 ended the day flat at 7,860.40, paring gains from earlier in the session.

India's benchmark Nifty 50 added 1.20%, while the BSE Sensex increased 1.07% as of 1:15 p.m. local time.

— Amala Balakrishner

Investors have seen a 'whiff' of stagflation, Mohamed El-Erian says

Market participants have gotten a taste of what so-called stagflation would look like, according to Mohamed El-Erian, chief economic advisor at Allianz.

Stagflation refers to a combination of higher prices and slower economic growth. Though this economic setup has not been seen in the U.S. in half a century, President Donald Trump's tariff policy has raised alarms that it could be coming back.

"I call it a whiff of stagflation," El-Erian said on CNBC's "Closing Bell: Overtime."

El-Erian added that investors should keep an eye out for anything that can show growth is cooling toward 1%, which he called "stall speed."

— Alex Harring

See the stocks moving after hours

These are some of the stocks making notable moves in after-hours trading:

• Eastman Kodak — Shares of the photography-focused company popped 9.2% after net income and operational EBITDA both came in higher for the fourth quarter compared with the same period a year prior. Revenue, on the other hand, slipped about 3% to $266 million for the quarter.
• Hallador Energy — The Indiana-based energy provider dropped 6.8% after revenue missed analysts' expectations for the fourth quarter. Hallador posted $94.2 million, under the consensus forecast of $95.5 million from the two analysts polled by FactSet.

— Alex Harring

Stock futures are little changed

Futures tied to the Dow, S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100 all sat near flat shortly after 6 p.m. ET. on Monday night.

— Alex Harring