Panic-buying signs in tech stocks emerge on Wall Street Tuesday despite Dow’s 300-point tumble

While the Dow Jones Industrial Average
DJIA,
-1.10%
on Tuesday was seeing its biggest one-day skid since around mid June, market internals suggest investors on the Nasdaq Inc.
NDAQ,
-0.94%
are buying rather than selling stocks. The Nasdaq Arms Index Arms Index, a volume-weighted breadth measure, fell to 0.473, while many on Wall Street see declines below 0.500 as suggesting panic buying. The Arms Index is calculated by dividing the ratio of the number of advancing stocks over decliners by the ratio of the volume of advancing stocks over declining volume and the Arms index often falls below 1.000, as the buyers rush into advancing stocks. Meanwhile, the Nasdaq Composite [c: COMP] was off 0.2% at 14,614, the S&P 500 index
SPX,
-0.81%
was off 0.6% at 4,326, and the Dow was trading 1% or off more than 330 points lower at 34,470, heading for its worst daily drop since June 18.