Dow Set to Open Down Amid Market's Tariff Fears
Stocks looked set to fall again on Friday as investors continued to fret about how President Donald Trump’s grand tariff plans will affect the economy.
Futures tracking the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 113 points, or 0.3%. S&P 500 futures fell 0.3%, and contracts tied to the tech-heavy Nasdaq 100 were down 0.5%. The three blue-chip indexes had traded sideways most of the previous session, before finishing in the red.
It’s been a quiet end to March for markets, with investors on edge about Trump’s ever-changing trade policies. There still isn’t much clarity about the severity of the tariffs to be imposed by the U.S. with just days to go until the April 2 deadline when the White House’s reciprocal levies are set to take effect.
“This remains a market which is desperately seeking a catalyst, and one where participants are reluctant to take on too much risk in the interim,” Pepperstone strategist Michael Brown wrote, pointing to the tariff deadline and next week’s March jobs report as events that “continue to loom large.”
The biggest event that could move stocks Friday is likely to be the release of the personal consumption expenditures index, which is expected to show inflation edged higher in February. The PCE gauge is the Federal Reserve’s preferred measure of price pressures, so it could give investors a sense of how much scope the central bank will have to cut interest rates later this year.
Bond yields retreated early Friday, with the yield on the 10-year U.S. Treasury note sliding 4 basis points to 4.326%. Benchmark oil prices edged lower, and a gauge of U.S. dollar strength was flat.