Tariff Crash April 2025: SPY's 18.8% Fall, 54-Day Recovery

On 9 April 2025, SPY (the S&P 500 ETF) rose 10.5% in one trading day. That was the third-largest daily gain in its price history, which starts in January 1993. The session before, the fund had closed at its low, 18.8% below its February high.

The fall included new US import duties announced on 2 April 2025. This guide uses the price files to date each step, from the 19 February 2025 high to the 8 April low, then to the first close above the old high. It does not test cause. We ran the same test on QQQ (the Nasdaq-100 ETF). All returns count dividends.

Executive Order 14257 is dated 2 April 2025. The Federal Register printed it on 7 April. It set an additional duty of 10% on goods from all trading partners, with exceptions listed in the order, from 12:01 a.m. eastern daylight time on 5 April.

The order also listed higher country-specific rates. These were due to apply from 12:01 a.m. eastern daylight time on 9 April.

A second order, Executive Order 14266, is dated 9 April and appeared in the Federal Register on 15 April. It suspended the country-specific rates for 90 days for every listed partner except China, from 10 April until 9 July 2025. The 10% duty stayed in place. The same order raised the added duty on goods from China to 125%.

5 April 2025 was a Saturday, so the first trading day under the 10% duty was 7 April.

We used the daily closing prices of SPY and QQQ in our price files, with dividends counted. SPY's file runs from 29 January 1993 to 26 October 2026, which is 8,493 prices. QQQ's runs from 10 March 1999, which is 6,951 prices.

A close is the last price of a trading day. The high is the highest close from the start of each file to 2 April 2025. The low is the lowest close from 3 April to 30 June 2025. A fall is the percentage drop from a close to a later close.

For both funds the high is the close of 19 February 2025. The low is the close of 8 April 2025. The recovery date is the first close after the low that is above the high.

A trading day is a day markets were open.

SPY closed on 2 April 2025 7.6% below its 19 February high. QQQ closed 11.6% below its own. Then came four trading days: 3, 4, 7 and 8 April.

From the 2 April close to the 8 April close, SPY fell 12.1% and QQQ fell 12.6%. From the high to the low, 34 trading days apart, SPY fell 18.8% and QQQ fell 22.8%.

Chart 1 shows both funds, with 19 February set to 100.

A bear market is usually defined as a fall of 20% or more from a high. SPY's fall of 18.8% did not reach that line, while QQQ's did.

Closing prices with dividends counted. Source: YX Insights price data

SPY fell 4.9% on 3 April and 5.9% on 4 April. Among SPY's 8,492 daily returns since 1993, those are the 24th and 13th worst. Over the two days, SPY lost 10.5%.

Then came the rebound. SPY rose 10.5% on 9 April. Two days in October 2008 rank above it. QQQ rose 12.0%, the fourth-largest of its 6,950 daily returns since March 1999.

SPY had 90 days with a move of 4% or more in either direction since 1993. Four of them fell on 3, 4, 9 and 10 April 2025. Chart 2 shows the daily moves.

The 9 April rebound came on the date of Executive Order 14266. The price files show when prices moved. They do not show why, because the files cannot separate the order from anything else that happened on those days.

SPY fell 4.4% on 10 April and QQQ fell 4.3%.

SPY closed above its 19 February high on 26 June 2025. That was 54 trading days after the low and 88 trading days after the high. QQQ did the same on 24 June, 52 days after its low and 86 days after its high.

SPY first closed at or above its 2 April level on 2 May 2025, 17 trading days after the low. QQQ first closed at or above its own on 1 May 2025.

How does this compare with earlier falls?

We took every SPY fall of 15% or more from a running closing high to the lowest close before a new closing high. There are seven between 29 January 1993 and 26 October 2026. The time we count is the trading days from the high to the first later close above it. Chart 3 gives that time for each fall.

The 2025 fall was the shallowest of the seven, at 18.8%.

It also had the shortest time from the high to a new high, at 88 trading days. That includes the 34 days of the fall. The 1998 fall, at 19.0%, took 89, one day more.

Counted from the low instead, 2025 is also the shortest, at 54 days against 59 for 1998. The 2020 fall of 33.7% took 120. The 2000 to 2002 fall of 47.5% took 1,657.

Our guide to stock market recovery time covers more of these, measured another way.

Take the 2 April close as the starting point and 26 October 2026 as the end. $10,000 in SPY became $13,782, a gain of 37.8%. The same path without the 9 April return would have ended at $12,473, a gain of 24.7%. The rebound day accounts for the gap.

For QQQ, $10,000 became $15,061. Without 9 April it would have ended at $13,447.

Our post on time in the market tests missing the best days over a longer window. On 26 October 2026, SPY's close stood 27.3% above its 19 February 2025 high and QQQ's stood 33.1% above its own.

The test covers two funds over one episode. It uses closing prices, so it misses moves inside each day. It ignores costs and tax.

The thresholds are our choices: 15% for a fall, the 2 April close as the reference, 30 June 2025 as the end of the low search. A different threshold changes the count of falls. At 20%, SPY has four falls. The 2025 fall is not one of them.

SPY and QQQ are both covered by our Multi-model Signals. This post reports no result from them.

Read together, the files show a fall of 18.8% in 34 trading days and a return above the old high 54 trading days after the low. Our guide to whether the stock market will crash sets that against how often falls of this size happen.

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This explainer is part of the YX Insights Academy. Each one takes a single idea and checks it against real data.

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Executive Order 14257, signed on 2 April 2025, set a 10% added duty on imports. SPY fell 4.9% on 3 April and 5.9% on 4 April, the two sessions that followed. Price files show the timing of the moves. They do not prove the cause, because they cannot separate the order from anything else that happened on those days.

The S&P 500 ETF, SPY, fell 12.1% from its 2 April close to its 8 April close, with dividends counted. Measured from its 19 February 2025 high, the fall to 8 April was 18.8%. QQQ, the Nasdaq-100 ETF, fell 12.6% and 22.8% over the same two spans.

SPY first closed above its 19 February 2025 high on 26 June 2025, 88 trading days after that high and 54 after the 8 April low. QQQ did so on 24 June 2025. A trading day is a day the market was open, so weekends do not count.

Not for SPY, but yes for QQQ. A bear market is usually defined as a fall of 20% or more from a high. SPY's closing fall to 8 April was 18.8%, while QQQ's was 22.8%. Both measures use daily closes with dividends counted.

The price files do not say. SPY rose 10.5% on 9 April 2025, the date of Executive Order 14266, which suspended the country-specific tariff rates for 90 days, except for China. Price data shows timing, not reason. It was SPY's third-largest daily gain since 1993, behind two days in October 2008.

DISCLAIMER: This article is intended for educational purposes only. Any information or analysis in this note does not constitute an offer to sell or a solicitation of an offer to buy any securities. Nothing in this note is intended to be investment advice, nor should it be relied upon to make investment decisions. Any opinions, analyses, or probabilities expressed in this note are those of the author as of the note's date of publication and are subject to change without notice.