U.S. stock indexes shook off a midday slump and ended mostly higher at the start of a week packed with several potential flashpoints for markets.
The S&P 500 edged up 0.1% Monday, its fifth gain in a row. The Dow Jones Industrial Average added 0.3%, and the Nasdaq composite slipped 0.1%.
Drops for some Big Tech stocks held back the market’s gains ahead of earnings reports this week from Amazon, Apple, Meta Platforms and Microsoft. Reports this week will also show how the U.S. economy performed at the start of 2025 and how many workers employers hired during April.
The tame closing prices were a lull following historic swings that have been rocking markets for weeks, as hopes rise and fall that President Donald Trump may back down on his trade war. Many investors believe Trump's tariffs could cause a recession if left unchecked.
Coming into Monday, the S&P 500 had roughly halved its drop that had taken it nearly 20% below its record set earlier this year. But weakness for some influential tech stocks ahead of their earnings reports later this week weighed on the market.
Amazon fell 1.6%, Microsoft sank 0.8%, Meta Platforms lost 0.2% and Apple slipped 0.1%. All are on the schedule to report their latest result this week, and they're some of Wall Street’s most influential companies because they’ve inflated to become some of the biggest in terms of size by far.
Outside of Big Tech, executives from Caterpillar, Exxon Mobil and McDonald’s may also offer clues this week about how they’re seeing economic conditions play out. Several companies across industries have recently been slashing their estimates for upcoming profit or pulling their forecasts completely because of uncertainty about what will happen with Trump’s tariffs.
“We heard more plans to mitigate tariff impacts than in prior months and than during 2018” from U.S. companies, including pre-ordering, shifting production and increasing prices for their own products, according to Bank of America strategist Savita Subramanian. But she also said in a report that she's seeing “some indications of a pause: no hiring/no firing, no new projects/no cancellations etc.”
A fear is that Trump’s on-again-off-again tariffs may be pushing households and businesses to alter their spending and freeze plans for long-term investment because of how quickly conditions can change, seemingly by the hour.
Domino’s Pizza slipped 0.4% after it reported weaker profit for the latest quarter than analysts expected and the pizza chain’s CEO, Russell Weiner, called the global economic environment “challenging.”
DoorDash dipped 0.4% after Deliveroo, the food delivery service based in London, said it heard from DoorDash about a possible cash offer to take over the company.
So far, economic reports have mostly seemed to show the U.S. economy is still growing, though at a weaker pace. On Wednesday, economists expect a report to say U.S. economic growth slowed to a 0.8% annual rate in the first three months of this year, down from a 2.4% pace at the end of last year.
But most reports Wall Street has received so far have focused on data from before Trump’s “Liberation Day” on April 2, when he announced tariffs that could affect imports from countries worldwide. That could raise the stakes for upcoming reports on the U.S. job market, including Friday’s, which will show how many workers employers hired during all of April.
Economists expect it to show a slowdown in hiring down to 125,000 from 228,000 in March.
The most jarring economic data recently have come from surveys showing U.S. consumers are getting much more pessimistic about the economy’s future because of tariffs. The Conference Board’s latest reading on consumer confidence will arrive on Tuesday.
In the bond market, Treasury yields fell some more. They’ve calmed since an unsettling, unusual spurt higher in yields earlier this month rattled both Wall Street and the U.S. government. That rise had suggested investors worldwide may have been losing faith in the U.S. bond market’s reputation as a safe place to park cash.
The yield on the 10-year Treasury fell to 4.22% from 4.29% late Friday.
In stock markets abroad, indexes were mixed amid modest moves across much of Europe and Asia. The CAC 40 in Paris rose 0.5%, but stocks slipped 0.2% in Shanghai.
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