Charley Blaine
8 min read
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Stock Market Today: Stocks Make a Comeback From Trade Jitters, Boeing Crash originally appeared on TheStreet.
Updated 4:30 p.m. ET
Stocks ended higher Thursday, as investors reacted to inflation data, while President Donald Trump pushed for an interest rate cut.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 101.85 points, or 0.24%, to finish the session at 42,967.62, while the S&P 500 rose 0.38% to close 6,045.26 and the tech-heavy Nasdaq advanced 0.24% to end the day at 19,662.48.
Microsoft hit a 52-week high of $480.40, while Oracle surged 13.3% after the software company beat Wall Street's fourth-quarter earnings expectations.
Trump called Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell a “numbskull” as he demanded an interest-rate cut, CNBC reported.
Trump claimed that lowering rates by 2 percentage points would save the U.S. $600 billion per year, “but we can’t get this guy to do it.”
“We’re going to spend $600 billion a year, $600 billion because of one numbskull that sits here [and says] ‘I don’t see enough reason to cut the rates now,’” Trump said.
Trump added that he was OK with the Fed raising rates if inflation was going up.
“But it’s down,” he said, “and I may have to force something.”
Updated 10:55 a.m. ET
Perhaps the label to describe Thursday's market is this: It's an inertia market. It sagged at the open, (for good reason with the Air India crash), regained its footing and now is drifting into the close with modest gains.
The issues that have dominated everyone's thinking at the open are still there:
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What will happen with tariffs? Short answer: Unclear and volatile. President Trump planned to impose unilateral tariffs on dozens of trading partners in the coming weeks unless they come up with real trade proposals.
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What is happening with interest rates? Short answer: The 10-year Treasury yield was at 4.36%, down from Wednesday's 4.427%.
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What will happen with President Trump's tax bill? Short answer: Not clear if any Senate Republicans will break with the president.
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How is the economy faring? Short answer: OK. Inflation is seemingly benign. Economic softness has not resulted in layoffs.
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How is the political stress? We'll find with the Army parade and the protests planned for around the country. One sign of rising tensions: Sen. Alex Padilla, D-Calif., was tossed out of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem's Los Angeles news conference today.
So, at 3:40 p.m. ET, the Standard & 500 Index was up 17 points to 6,040. The Nasdaq Composite Index was up 31 points to 19,647.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average were up 61 points to 42,927. The index had been down as many as 259 points right after the open.
