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Stocks looked set to pare back some of their recent losses Thursday, with investors still trying to make sense of U.S. President Donald Trump’s seemingly ever-changing trade policies.
Futures tracking the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 350 points, or 0.8%. S&P 500 futures were up 1.0%, and contracts tied to the Nasdaq 100 climbed 1.2%.
The three blue-chip indexes all tumbled Wednesday after chip maker Nvidia said it would now need a license to export some of its processors to China. Following Nvidia’s news, chip maker Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company reported better-than-expected earnings ahead of the opening bell Thursday. But CEO C.C. Wei warned Trump’s tariffs could serve as a headwind.
The fresh chip curbs overshadowed a report that Beijing could be open to entering trade negotiations with the Trump administration.
“These reports contained so many ‘ifs’, ‘buts’, and ‘maybes’ that the offer seemed to be more of a token gesture, than anything else…the rhetoric from China was very much in keeping with that heard in recent weeks, so doesn’t really move the needle very much,” Pepperstone strategist Michael Brown said. “Still, I guess it shows how desperate participants are to jump on any kind of good news right now.”
Investors also appeared to see better-than-expected retail data as a sign consumers are stocking up ahead of tariffs, rather than an indicator that the U.S. economy is looking strong.
Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell added to the sour mood by making it clear the central bank won’t step in to rescue markets. The European Central Bank is set to announce its latest interest-rate decision Thursday, and the market will be watching to see if policymakers offer any update about how tariffs have affected their economic outlook.
The yield on the benchmark 10-year U.S. Treasury note climbed 4 basis points to 4.325% in early trading. The WSJ Dollar Index, which tracks the buck against a basket of 16 other currencies, ticked up 0.3%.
