Wall Street drifts through a rare quiet day following weeks of tariff
turmoil
[April 16, 2025] By
STAN CHOE
NEW YORK (AP) — U.S. stocks drifted Tuesday through a rare quiet day for
financial markets.
The S&P 500 slipped 0.2%. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 155
points, or 0.4%, and the Nasdaq composite edged down by less than 0.1%.
The modest moves offered some respite following the huge swings that
have battered Wall Street recently, not just day to day but also hour to
hour. The day before, the S&P 500 went from a gain of 1.8% to a slight
loss and back to a gain as it struggled to keep up with shifts in
President Donald Trump’s trade war, which economists warn could cause a
global recession unless it’s scaled back.
Perhaps more importantly, the U.S. bond market also showed more signs of
calm after its sudden and sharp moves last week raised worries that
investors worldwide may no longer see U.S. government bonds as a
no-brainer go-to when times are scary.
The yield on the 10-year Treasury eased to 4.33% from 4.38% late Monday.
It had pulled back to there from 4.48% at the end of last week after
surging from just 4.01% a week earlier. A drop in yields is what usually
happens when investors are scared, and this week’s moves offer a return
to form for what historically had been seen as one of the safest
investments possible.
The value of the U.S. dollar also steadied after tumbling last week,
which had raised more worries that Trump’s trade war was degrading its
status as a safe-haven investment, as with U.S. Treasury bonds. The
dollar’s value ticked higher against the euro and Swiss franc, though it
slipped against the British pound.
On Wall Street, Albertsons' stock fell 7.6% despite reporting a stronger
profit for the latest quarter than analysts expected. The company behind
Safeway, Vons and other grocery stores gave a forecast for profit in the
upcoming year that was short of analysts’.
DaVita sank 3% for a second straight drop after it said a ransomware
attack is affecting some of its operations. The health care company said
it’s still investigating the attack, which it learned about Saturday,
and that it can’t yet know the “full scope, nature, and potential
ultimate impact.”
On the winning side of Wall Street was Bank of America, which climbed
3.6% after the Charlotte, North Carolina-based bank reported stronger
profit for the latest quarter than analysts expected.
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Trader Edward McCarthy, left, works on the floor of the New York
Stock Exchange, Tuesday, April 15, 2025. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)
 Most big U.S. banks have been
reporting strong results for the start of the year, boosted by their
stock trading desks taking advantage of all the huge swings caused
by Trump’s on-again-off-again tariff announcements. Citigroup also
topped analysts’ expectations, and its stock rose 1.8%.
Palantir Technologies climbed 6.2% for a second day
of gains after NATO said it would use the company’s
artificial-intelligence capabilities in its allied command
operations.
All told, the S&P 500 slipped 9.34 points to 5,396.63. The Dow Jones
Industrial Average fell 155.83 to 40,368.96, and the Nasdaq
composite edged down by 8.32 to 16,823.17.
Even with the market’s modest moves Tuesday, worries continue about
the trade war. The United States and China, the world’s two largest
economies, have been announcing ever-increasing tariffs on each
other’s goods, along with other countermeasures to raise the stakes.
Trump has said he wants to bring manufacturing jobs back to the
United States, and he also wants to trim how much more his country
exports to other countries than it imports.
China’s leadership, meanwhile, has been trying to present itself as
a source of “stability and certainty” as it visits countries across
Southeast Asia this week.
In stock markets abroad, indexes rose across much of Europe and
Asia. Germany’s DAX returned 1.4%, and the FTSE 100 in London
climbed 1.4%.
Automakers helped drive indexes higher in Asia, where Japan’s Nikkei
225 added 0.8% and South Korea’s Kospi rose 0.9%.
Chinese stocks wobbled, with Hong Kong’s Hang Seng rising 0.2% after
fluctuating much of the day. Stocks in Shanghai added 0.1%.
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AP Business Writers Yuri Kageyama and Matt Ott contributed.
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