Wall Street is rising but remains nervous
information provided by AFP • 04/11/2025 at 4:25 p.m.
An operator at the New York Stock Exchange, April 3, 2025. (AFP / CHARLY TRIBALLEAU)
After a downturn in the market, the New York Stock Exchange rose on Friday thanks to bank results and the end of a very eventful week, but remains nervous about the trade offensive launched by Donald Trump.
At around 2:10 PM GMT, the Dow Jones gained 0.38%, the Nasdaq index gained 0.65% and the broader S&P 500 index gained 0.42%.
Despite the continued market excitement, "we are seeing a sort of sigh of relief (on Friday) from the investor market," Adam Sarhan of 50 Park Investments told AFP.
One of the reasons for this is that "investors feared that the big banks would have a very bad quarter" because of Donald Trump's trade offensive, but "this is not the case," the analyst assures.
Banks published generally encouraging results before the opening of Wall Street, even though their prices were moving in a see-saw pattern at the opening.
US bank JPMorgan Chase (+1.88%) reported first-quarter results on Friday that beat expectations, as did US investment bank Morgan Stanley (-0.71%).
The American bank Wells Fargo, which posted mixed results (-4.14%), expects a "more unstable economic environment" in 2025, which could weigh on its growth, warns its boss.
The same sentiment was echoed by JPMorgan Chase, with its CEO, Jamie Dimon, warning of the "considerable turbulence" the economy is facing.
"Stock market volatility reflects declining confidence in corporate forecasts due to the impact of tariffs, with recession fears influencing investor behavior," O'Hare said.
Market players remain nervous and the markets are particularly fragile in the face of the escalation in the trade war between Beijing and Washington.
The day before, the American market had closed sharply down.
In the latest episode, China announced Friday that it would raise its additional customs duties on American products to 125%, in response to the 145% tariffs imposed by the White House this week on its imports.
"Not only is (China) copying what Trump says, but Beijing is also making fun of him," Sarhan noted of China's new tariffs. "This is not going to please the American president," he believes.
"The escalating trade war between the United States and China, marked by reciprocal tariffs exceeding 100%, has disrupted global trade and increased economic uncertainty," Patrick O'Hare of Briefing.com summarized in a note.
In terms of indicators, US companies saw their production costs generally decrease in April, mainly due to the drop in oil prices, according to the PPI index published Friday.
Over one month, the producer price index fell by 0.4% (compared to +0.1% the previous month, a value revised upwards), according to the report from the US Department of Labor.
This came as a surprise to analysts who had expected it to rise by 0.2%, according to the consensus published by MarketWatch.
"It's another sigh of relief on the inflation front," said Chris Zaccarelli of Northlight Asset Management.
On the bond market, the yield on ten-year US government bonds rose sharply to 4.52%, compared to 4.41% the previous day at closing.
Donald Trump acknowledged Wednesday that he was monitoring the decline in the US debt market before deciding on a three-month pause on some of his tariff surcharges, while maintaining the 10% already in force.
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