The Globe and Mail reports in its Friday edition that Wall Street ended sharply lower on Thursday and the S&P 500 confirmed it is in a correction. A Reuters dispatch to The Globe says that Canada's main stock index also closed lower, though losses were more modest thanks in part to gold prices rising to a record. The S&P 500 closed 10.1 per cent below its Feb. 19 record closing high, confirming the bellwether index has been in a correction since then. "Sentiment's terrible," said Mike Dickson at Horizon Investments in Charlotte, N.C. In the latest episode of U.S. President Donald Trump's multifront trade war, the European Union responded to blanket U.S. tariffs on steel and aluminum by imposing a 50-per-cent tax on American whisky exports. A broad sell-off sent all three major U.S. stock indexes tumbling, with losses in tech and tech-related megacap shares dragging the Nasdaq nearly 2 per cent. The S&P/TSX Composite Index ended down 220.11 at 24,203.23, its lowest closing level since Oct. 31. The materials group added 2.4 per cent as gold approached the $3,000 milestone. First Quantum jumped 14.4 per cent after Panama authorized the sale of copper concentrate at the company's shuttered Cobre Panama mine.