Selling Resumes in Face of Uncertainty Over Tariffs

Wall Street's sell-off kicked back into gear on Thursday, and a US stock market rattled by the whiplash created by President Trump's tariffs and uncertainty about the economy fell sharply.

• The Dow fell 427.51 points, or 1%, to 42,579.08.
• The S&P 500 fell 104.11 points, or 1.8%, to 5,738.52.
• The Nasdaq fell 483.48 points, or 2.6%, to 18,069.26.

Stocks fell even though Trump on Thursday offered a one-month reprieve from his 25% tariffs on many goods imported from Mexico and Canada, the AP reports. That's unlike the bounce stocks got the prior day from his one-month exemption for automakers. The moves keep hope alive that Trump may be using tariffs as a tool for negotiations rather than as a permanent policy and that he may ultimately avoid a worst-case trade war that grinds down economies and sends inflation higher. But Trump is pressing ahead with other tariffs scheduled to take effect April 2. And the dizzying back-and-forth moves on tariffs are only amping up the uncertainty. It was just Monday that Trump said there was "no room" for negotiations that could lower the tariffs on Mexico and Canada, which took effect Tuesday.

"These exemptions don't do much to resolve the general air of uncertainty," said Yung-Yu Ma, of BMO Wealth Management. Some big retailers have offered warning signals about how much US consumers can keep spending. Macy's on Thursday reported slightly weaker revenue for the end of 2024 than analysts expected, though its profit topped expectations. It also gave a forecast for profit in 2025 shy of analysts' predictions. Its shares fell 0.7%. It was a similar story for Victoria's Secret, which beat Wall Street's fourth-quarter sales and profit forecasts but gave a revenue forecast for the upcoming year that fell short of analysts' expectations. Its stock fell 8.2%. Semiconductor companies and their suppliers were particularly heavy weights, after soaring because of the frenzy around artificial-intelligence technology. Marvell Technology lost nearly a fifth of its value and dropped 19.8%. Nvidia fell 5.7%, while Broadcom lost 6.3%. They were two of the heaviest weights on the S&P 500. (More Wall Street stories.)