With the US stock market poised for further falls this afternoon, investors looked for the dust to settle before moving in on potential investment company bargains.

Today’s sharp falls in UK and global equities were replicated in many investment trusts. Tellingly the early morning sell-off was not generally followed by a bounce as investors waited to see if the sell-off we’ve seen in August so far continues or turns out to be a summer squall.

Investors will also need tomorrow’s net asset value (NAV) updates to determine the size of any share price discounts on listed equity funds. Already it looks like the narrowing in the average investment company discount to 12% we saw in Trust Watch on Friday will have unwound.

The obvious fallers were in the FTSE 100 giants. By Monday afternoon Scottish Mortgage (SMT ) had fallen 8.6% to 743.4p, wiping out this year’s gains for the £10.7bn tech-heavy Baillie Gifford flagship which closed last week on a 10% estimated discount according to Deutsche Numis.

Similarly, Pershing Square Holdings (PSH ), Bill Ackman’s £6.6bn US equities fund, slid 7% to £33.36 having finished Friday on a 27% discount. The top performer over five years was hit last month by the slump in its biggest holding Universal Music Group.

3i Group (III ) was comparatively resilient, falling 2.9% to £28.29 despite the elevated 42% premium on its shares. Investors may reckon that Action, the fast-growing discount retailer that accounts for around two thirds of its £20bn portfolio, may be well placed if economic conditions deteriorate.

Outside the FTSE 100, the big investment company fallers were in Japan – where the Nikkei 225 stunned investors with a 12% plunge – and in other funds weighted to technology along with some fallers in UK smaller companies.

Among Japan trusts, the big fallers were CC Japan Income & Growth (CCJI ) which slid 8.9% to 168.5p, potentially widening its comparatively narrow discount of 5.6% at Friday’s close.

Smaller companies activist AVJ Japan Opportunity (AJOT ) retreated 7.8% to 121p having ended last week on a 5% discount, according to Deutsche Numis. Rival Nippon Active Value (NAVF ) and Fidelity Japan (FJV ) held up the best, both off 4.4%, while the rest of the sector traded around 5% lower.

Invesco Asia Trust (IAT ) led the fallers in its region, down 7.6% at 293p having finished last week on an 11.7% discount in line with its one-year average.

With highly-valued US tech stocks under scrutiny, both Allianz Technology (ATT ) and Polar Capital (PCT ) gave up 8% and 7.4% from their big gains of the past two years. Allianz was already looking ‘dear’ on Friday with a comparatively narrow 7% discount given its shares have on average traded 11% below net asset value in the past year.

Manchester & London (MNL ) dropped 6.9% to 598p from a slightly wider-than-average 17.6% discount last week.

Augmentum Fintech (AUGM ), the early-stage investor in unquoted financial services disrupters, dropped 5.6% to 105p, potentially widening its already wide 33.5% discount.

UK equity funds broadly fell in line with the FTSE indices. The most prominent faller was a 8.6% drop in Chris Mills’ smaller company trust Oryx International (OIG ), which had seen its wide discount narrow to 19% in the pare- and post-election small-cap rally.

It’s always interesting to see which investment trusts buck bad days on the market.

Global Opportunities Trust (GOT ), a cash-heavy absolute return fund of trusts run by Dr Sandy Nairn, added 2.7% to 302p. The shares had slipped to an above-averate discount of 21.7% last week.

Of the more well-known ‘wealth preservation’ funds, Ruffer (RICA ) did best, rising 2.9% to 285p, which may start to mollify some of its critics over the recent improvement in performance.

Bond and loan fund TwentyFour Select Monthly Income (SMIF ) offered a safe haven with the 9%-yielding shares firming 1.6% to 84.2p despite closing last week just above their asset value.