US equity markets fell sharply as heightened geopolitical conflict in the Middle East and concerns about rising inflationary pressures hit investor sentiment – Dow dropped -953-points or -1.87% to 49,918.78, booking its first close below <50,000 since 19 May and steepest one-day decline calendar year-to-date. Caterpillar Inc dropped -6.4% to be the worst performer in the 30-stock index Honeywell International Inc -4.55% Nvidia Corp –3.73% Amazon.com Inc (-2.53%), Boeing Co (-2.57%), Goldman Sachs Group Inc (-2.98%) and Salesforce Inc (-2.53%) all fell over >2.5%.