Stock market today: Dow, S&P 500, Nasdaq futures plunge with Trump tariff rout set to escalate

JPMorgan believes the US economy will enter a recession in the back half of 2025 as the impact of President Trump tariffs takes hold in the economy.

The firm’s chief US economist Michael Feroli sees a two-quarter recession occurring in the back half of 2025 as GDP contracts by 1% in the third quarter of the year and by 0.5% in the fourth quarter. For the full-year 2025, Feroli’s team projects GDP will fall by 0.3%.

“We now expect real GDP [gross domestic product] to contract under the weight of the tariffs,” Feroli wrote in a note to clients on Friday night.

Feroli added that a “recession in economic activity” will push the unemployment rate up to 5.3%. New data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics released on Friday showed the unemployment rate stood at 4.2% in March. While other economists have noted the risks to recession are rising, JPMorgan marks the first major Wall Street research team to forecast a recession as Trump’s tariffs weigh on economic growth.

“The pinch from higher prices that we expect in coming months may hit harder than in the post-pandemic inflation spike, as nominal income growth has been moderating recently, as opposed to accelerating in the earlier episode,” Feroli wrote. “Moreover, in an environment of heightened uncertainty consumers may be reluctant to dip too far into savings to finance spending growth.”

Some of President Trump’s prominent backers in the business community are sounding the alarm on his rollout of reciprocal tariffs and the resulting market fallout.

Outspoken billionaire investor Bill Ackman, who endorsed the president last July following the assassination attempt on Trump, said in a lengthy post on X late Sunday that, barring Trump calling a “time out” on his tariffs plans, we could be headed for an “economic nuclear winter.”

“The President has an opportunity on Monday to call a time out and have the time to execute on fixing an unfair tariff system,” Ackman wrote.

“Alternatively, we are heading for a self-induced, economic nuclear winter, and we should start hunkering down.

“May cooler heads prevail.”

In his post, Ackman argued the US is “100% behind the president on fixing a global system of tariffs that has disadvantaged the country.”

“But,” Ackman added, “business is a confidence game and confidence depends on trust.”

On Sunday evening, stock futures were pointing to a third day of sharp losses after the S&P 500 (^GSPC) fell over 10% across Thursday and Friday’s trading sessions, while the Nasdaq (^IXIC) entered a bear market.

Trump’s reciprocal tariff announcements on Wednesday, dubbed “Liberation Day” by the White House, surprised investors and exceeded most Wall Street forecasts. Initial estimates put the combined tariff rate on all US imports well north of 20%, which would be the highest in over a century.

Wall Street strategists have slashed their forecasts for the stock market in response to Trump’s tariff plan and at least one firm has called for the US to enter recession this year as a result.

Ackman said Trump’s rollout of these tariffs has set in motion a “process of destroying confidence in our country as a trading partner, as a place to do business, and as a market to invest capital.”

Instead, Ackman is calling on Trump to institute a 90-day time out to begin negotiations on “unfair asymmetric tariff deals, and induce trillions of dollars of new investment in our country.”

“If, on the other hand, on April 9th we launch economic nuclear war on every country in the world,” Ackman wrote, “business investment will grind to a halt, consumers will close their wallets and pocket books, and we will severely damage our reputation with the rest of the world that will take years and potentially decades to rehabilitate.

“What CEO and what board of directors will be comfortable making large, long-term, economic commitments in our country in the middle of an economic nuclear war?

“I don’t know of one who will do so?”

Speaking to reporters aboard Air Force One on Sunday, President Trump said sometimes you have to take medicine when asked about the market’s recent sell-off, according to Reuters.

The president added that his policies were not intentionally trying to engineer a market sell-off.

“I don’t want anything to go down, but sometimes you have to take medicine to fix something,” he said.

Trump’s comments come as markets appeared set to begin the week where they left off Friday, with US stock futures down sharply across the board with Nasdaq 100 futures off more than 4% and futures tied to the Dow and S&P 500 both off more than 3.4%.

Last week, the Nasdaq closed in a bear market and the S&P 500’s losses reached 17% from the benchmark index’s record high hit back in February.

This weekend, Trump’s economic surrogates attempted to make clear in media appearances that the president’s shock tariff announcements last week were not a negotiation tactic.

Speaking Sunday evening, the president said no deal on tariffs with China would be forthcoming unless the US’ trade deficit with China was fixed. The US’ trade deficit with China reached $295 billion last year.

Trump added that he has spoken to leaders in Europe and Asia regarding his tariffs unveiled last week.

In China, investors braced for a tough day as markets reopened after an extended weekend, absorbing the impact of Beijing’s retaliatory tariffs on US goods.

A gauge of Chinese stocks listed in the US plunged 8.9% on Friday, reflecting fears of further trade tensions. The Hang Seng China Enterprises Index, (^HSCE) one of the year’s top performers, has begun a sharp pullback, dropping 9.4%

Meanwhile, the Nikkei 225 (^N225) fell nearly 8%, putting it at its lowest levels since 2023.

China’s swift tariff response, following President Trump’s tariff hike on the country, raised global recession fears. Goldman Sachs downgraded its targets for Chinese equity indices, with the MSCI China (CHH=F) Index target cut to 81 from 85.

Read more here.

TOKYO (Reuters) – Oil prices fell more than 3% on Monday, extending losses from the previous week, on growing concerns that a global trade war could slow the global economy and weaken oil demand, following China’s retaliation against U.S. President Donald Trump’s tariffs.

Read more here.

Our tariff live blog has been running throughout the weekend, and it has a lot of the context you need to know heading into the trading week.

The key theme is that Trump administration officials struck a defiant tone on the president’s tariff plans. A sampling, per our accounting:

See the latest updates here.

Bitcoin (BTC-USD) plummeted Sunday, putting it on track to test levels from before the election, which sent the token on a rip-roaring rally in the final months of last year.

At last check, the cryptocurrency was trading around $78,600 per token, which puts it just above year-to-date lows.

Ethereum (ETH-USD) saw an even more intense plunge, down around $1,600 per token, its lowest point since late 2023.

Futures tied to the major indexes were all down around 4% as trading opened Sunday night: