Rob Haworth is senior investment strategy director at U.S. Bank Wealth Management.

"We've had tough economic data. First, the flash purchasing managers' surveys from Europe were disappointing. U.S. purchasing managers' surveys from S&P Global were also disappointing, as well as new home sales, which came in much below expectations. Expectations have been for around 750,000. We came in at 591,000 for last month, which is quite surprising and reflects a significant slowdown in home purchase activity."

The Dow did eke out a small gain at the very end of the session. The S&P 500 also pared losses in afternoon trading but still finished eight tenths of percent lower, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq lost 2.3%.

Much of the sell-off was driven by a profit warning from Snap, which sent its shares plummeting 43% - their worst single-day loss in the company's history.

That took down the entire social media segment, with Facebook-owner Meta Platforms, Google-parent Alphabet, Twitter and Pinterest all notching significant losses.

Shares of Abercrombie & Fitch fell 28% after the apparel retailer posted a surprise quarterly loss and cut its annual sales and revenue outlook.

But shares of Zoom Video Communications jumped more than five and a half percent after the work-from-home darling raised it full-year profit forecast, citing solid enterprise demand.