CE 100 Index Plunges 4.3% as Payment and Banking Names Slide on Tariff Volatility

It was a rough week for the CE 100 Index, which lost 4.3% across five days of trading, outpacing the losses seen in all other benchmarks, from the NASDAQ to the Dow.

Macro concerns weighed on the markets in general, as tariffs went into effect early in the week, and then were modified, clouding at least some visibility on enterprises’ planning across supply chains — and for consumer spending too. Through the week, as reported here, job growth slowed, in figures that have yet to reflect the widespread cuts to staffing levels at several government agencies.

Only one of the 11 pillars — the Communicate pillar — gained ground, up 0.9%.

Banking stocks led to the downside, down by more than 7.9%.  Banks, of course, would be among the firms impacted by tariffs as the lending environment becomes even more uncertain.

Citigroup shares dipped 11.9%.  The shares slid in the wake of widely reported news at the end of the month: the bank accidentally credited a client’s account with $81 trillion — when $280 had been the intended amount to send — and then quickly repaired that mistake.

LendingClub lost 12.5%.  J.P. Morgan was 8.5% lower, amid reports that the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) dropped its lawsuit targeting the operator and three owner banks of Zelle. The CFPB has dismissed the action against Early Warning Services, J.P. Morgan Chase, Bank of America and Wells Fargo “with prejudice,” which means the suit cannot be revived.

MongoDB Leads to the Downside

In the Enablers segment, which slid 3.7%, MongoDB shares plummeted by nearly 30%.  In the company’s most recent earnings results, announced this past week, guidance of between $2.24 billion to $2.28 billion in revenues for the current fiscal year fell short of expectations for $2.32 billion in the firm’s consolidated top line. The revenue growth would mark a significant slowdown from the fiscal fourth quarter revenue growth of 20% and the slowest pace since the company began trading on public markets back in 2017.  Atlas, the firm’s database offering, is seeing slower growth, according to management commentary on the conference call.

Payment Names Slide

Within the Pay and be Paid pillar of the CE 100 Index, (off by 5.4%), BNPL names declined by significant amounts, leading that segment lower. The key names in this space have been especially volatile in the wake of earnings reports.   This past week, the Federal Reserve noted pressures on consumer spending.

Sezzle shares slipped 21.9%.  Affirm shares gave up 19%.  In an announcement,  Affirm said that it has added Stitch Fix to its merchant network.

Tencent countered some of those losses, up 9.3%.

As reported by PYMNTS, Tencent said its new artificial intelligence model is faster than that of DeepSeek. The company’s Hunyuan Turbo S AI model has been designed to provide instant responses — a design that distinguishes itself from the deep reasoning offered by China’s DeepSeek.

Western Union was up 7.3%.  The company said at the end of the month it was launching an international money transfer service with Saudi Arabia’s urpay tied to the urpay wallet, enabling customers to seamlessly send money to friends and family globally.

Visa and Mastercard moved this past week on the news that they are facing regulatory action in the United Kingdom following a payments watchdog’s investigation. As reported, the Payment Systems Regulator (PSR) is considering “remedies” for the two companies amid allegations the card market is uncompetitive. Mastercard emailed a statement to PYMNTS that countered, “We disagree with the findings in [the] report, which continues to underplay the true competitiveness of the payment industry and our ongoing innovation and investment into security and the consumer experience.”  Visa shares slipped 4.8%; Mastercard’s stock lost 5.2%.