NEW YORK (AP) — Most U.S. stocks drifted higher in quiet trading Thursday following a jumble of mixedreports that offered little clarity on how the U.S. economy is managing through President Donald Trump’s trade war.
The S&P 500 rose 0.4%, enough to extend its winning streak to a fourth day and to pull within 3.7% of its all-time high set earlier this year. The Dow Jones Industrial Average added 271 points, or 0.6%, and the Nasdaq composite slipped 0.2%.
Stocks got a lift from easing Treasury yields in the bond market. They fell after the economic reports suggested the Federal Reserve may have more room to cut interest rates later this year to bolster the U.S. economy if it weakens under the weight of high tariffs.
But the reports did little to spell out whether the economy is falling toward a recession, as many investors had been fearing, or shaking off the uncertainty after Trump called off many of his tariffs temporarily. The headliner reports said shoppers spent less at U.S. retailers last month than expected, while inflation was better at the wholesale level than economists forecast. Other updates said U.S. manufacturing looks like it’s still contracting but fewer U.S. workers are applying for unemployment benefits than expected.
Even though China and the United States recently agreed on a 90-day stand-down for many of their tariffs, “the trade story isn’t over, and it’s still going to take time for tariffs to make themselves felt in economic data,” according to Ellen Zentner, chief economic strategist for Morgan Stanley Wealth Management.
Such uncertainty showed itself in Walmart’s stock, which slipped 0.5% even though it reported a bigger profit for the latest quarter than analysts expected.
Like other U.S. companies struggling through Trump’s on-again-off-again rollout of tariffs, Walmart said it decided not to offer a forecast for how much profit it will make in the current quarter.
Chief Financial Officer John David Rainey pointed to “the range of near-term outcomes being exceedingly wide and difficult to predict,” though the company did say it expects sales to grow between 3.5% and 4.5%, not including the swings that shifting values of foreign currencies can bring.
The nation’s largest retailer also said that it must raise prices due to higher costs caused by Trump’s tariffs.
Equipment maker Deere said it’s seeing “near-term market challenges” and called the situation “dynamic,” as many other companies have. It lowered the bottom end of its forecasted range of profit for the full year. But Deere’s stock nevertheless rose 3.8% after it reported a stronger profit for the latest quarter than analysts expected.
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