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As the world reels from tariffs instituted by the Trump administration, stock markets are widely in decline. On Friday, U.S. stock saw the worst decline since the COVID-19 pandemic began in 2020. President Donald Trump said Sunday, "I don't want anything to go down, but sometimes you have to take medicine to fix something and we have such a horrible -- we have been treated so badly by other countries because we had stupid leadership that allowed this to happen."

Greek equities could regain the coveted developed market status by index provider FTSE Russell this week - a key step on the country's return to normalcy following a decade-long debt crisis and a move that could spur millions of dollars in inflows. FTSE Russell could become the first among major index providers to re-classify Greek equities when it issues its country classification interim update on Tuesday. The index provider put Greece's stock market on a watch list for potential promotion from Advanced Emerging in October, adding it met all developed market criteria but one - credit worthiness of the economy was still seen as "speculative".

An unfounded claim that President Donald Trump was considering pausing the implementation of sizable tariffs briefly sent U.S. stocks skyrocketing on Monday, an indication of just how volatile the current economic situation has become.

The major U.S. equity indexes were lower midday Monday, as the Trump administration showed no signs of pulling back from sweeping reciprocal tariffs.

BlackRock CEO Larry Fink said stock markets could fall 20% farther as steep U.S. tariffs lead some investors to believe the U.S. economy may already be contracting. "Most CEOs I talk to would say we are probably in a recession right now," Fink told the Economic Club of New York on Monday. Still, the leader of the world's largest asset manager said stock market weakness since the tariff announcement on Wednesday was "more of a buying opportunity than a selling opportunity," in the long run and did not pose systemic risks.

Markets were gripped by volatility as investors looked for any clue as to whether the White House might change course.

The unverified rumor, since debunked, came from an anonymous X account named Walter Bloomberg.