Banks, tech companies drag markets to worst day in nearly 3 weeks

Escalating tensions on the Korean peninsula rattled nerves Tuesday on Wall Street, leading to the stock market’s worst day in almost three weeks.

Bank stocks led the slide as bond yields slumped. Technology stocks, the biggest gainers this year, also pulled the market lower. Energy companies climbed the most as the price of crude oil rose.

Traders also bid up shares in traditional safe-haven investments such as utilities and gold, which climbed to the highest level in more than a year.

“Today the risk-off trade really is North Korea front and center,” said Jeff Zipper, managing director of investments at U.S. Bank Private Wealth Management. “Also you have the hurricane last week and the upcoming hurricane, so there’s a lot on the plate for the market to digest.”

The Standard & Poor’s 500 index slid 18.70 points, or 0.8 percent, to 2,457.85. The Dow Jones industrial average slumped 234.25 points, or 1.1 percent, to 21,753.31. The Nasdaq composite lost 59.76 points, or 0.9 percent, to 6,375.57.

Stocks were coming off back-to-back weekly gains as investors returned from the Labor Day holiday weekend to heightened tensions between the U.S. and North Korea, which conducted its most powerful nuclear test Sunday, triggering U.S. warnings of a “massive military response.”