Wall Street dipped on Friday on persistent trade concerns
Wall Street’s benchmark S&P 500 stock index dipped on Friday on persistent trade concerns, while U.S. 10-year Treasury yields declined from a near seven-year peak after a burst higher this week.
Investors were digesting moves from earlier in the week, when the benchmark 10-year U.S. Treasury note yield broke above 3.1 percent and oil topped $80 a barrel. On Friday, oil prices settled lower but benchmark Brent logged a sixth week of gains.
Trade was on the top of investors’ minds as U.S. President Donald Trump said he was determined to stop China from “taking our jobs, taking our money” as U.S. and Chinese negotiators met for a second day to try to avert a tariff war. On Thursday, the top U.S. trade official poured cold water on the prospect of an imminent breakthrough in talks to rework the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).
Investment strategist with Edward Jones in St. Louis, Kate Warne said that the driver is continued concerns about trade and the seeming lack of progress on both NAFTA and the negotiations with China. Warne thinks that’s why markets are caught and not moving much because no one is certain about which way any of these will go, and whether there’s good news or whether they need to worry more about what happens next.
On Wall Street, the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 1.11 points to 24,715.09, the S&P 500 lost 7.16 points, or 0.26 percent, to 2,712.97 and the Nasdaq Composite dropped 28.13 points, or 0.38 percent, to 7,354.34.
U.S. 10-year Treasury yields declined from a near seven-year high as buyers emerged following a bond market selloff earlier this week spurred by worries about growing inflation and government borrowing.
Benchmark 10-year notes last rose 13/32 in price to yield 3.0633 percent, from 3.109 percent late on Thursday.
Head of government and agency trading at R.W. Pressprich & Co in New York, Larry Milstein said it’s a grind higher in yields. Larry said the data is still pretty good. They make people think the economy is doing well.
The dollar index rose 0.22 percent.
