Wall Street Erases Day's Gains On Reports Of Trump Moving Ahead With 104% Tariffs On China

Wall Street on Tuesday erased the day's gains logged in the first half of trade after reports said that the Donald Trump-led administration was moving ahead with the imposition of 104% tariffs on China.

A day earlier, the US president had warned that he would slap additional 50% tariffs on China if the latter does not withdraw the 34% retaliatory duties it has imposed on American imports.

Since Beijing did not budge from his position, the US government is proceeding ahead with the imposition of additional 50% tariff on China, taking the overall levy on imports from the Asian economy to 104%, news agency Bloomberg reported, citing an official. The additional tariffs will come into effect from midnight on Wednesday.

Immediately following the reports, all three major US stock market indices erased nearly all the gains that they logged in the first half of trade, and were almost flat.

By 1:30 pm (EST), S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite turned negative. S&P 500 was down 0.14% at 5,055.13, and Nasdaq slipped 0.44% to 15,534.9. The Dow Jones Industrial Average, however, still edged higher by 0.28% at 38,075.71.

Earlier in the day, Wall Street rebounded as it opened for trade after three days of slump. The Dow Jones Industrial Average had surged by 3.7% or 1,419 points shortly after the trading commenced. The S&P 500 gained 4%, which was the highest intraday gain since November 2022. The Nasdaq was also up 3.5%.

Healthcare companies had led the gains in the early trade, with CVS Health Corp and United Health jumping around 9% in trade so far.

The shares of NVIDIA and Micron also saw gains of over 5% in early trade. JPMorgan, AMD and Netflix also marked similar gains, supporting the rise in the index in the first half of trading.

The Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index had fell 0.5% as the market opened. The price of Bitcoin rose over 1% to $80,254.62.

In the oil market, the US West Texas Intermediate Crude rose 1.4% to $61.55 per barrel, whereas Brent crude rose 0.9% to $64.77 a barrel.

Before the Wall Street opened, the Indian stock market ended on a positive note on Tuesday. The benchmark equity indices snapped a three-day losing streak, with NSE Nifty 50 ending 73.3 points or 1.69%, higher at 22,535.85, whereas BSE Sensex ended 1,135.68 points or 1.55%, higher at 74,273.58.