U.S. stocks fell on Friday, notching a weekly loss, after President Donald Trump recommended 50% tariffs on European goods, reopening a new front in global trade tensions and unleashing a fresh wave of market uncertainty. Canada’s main stock index edged higher as gold mining shares rallied.
All three main Wall Street indexes pared early losses but each still ended lower and shed more than 2% for the week. Technology, communication services and consumer discretionary stocks were the biggest losers of the S&P 500’s 11 subsectors. Utilities, consumer staples and energy stocks gained.
Apple touched a two-week low and finished down 3% after Trump warned the iPhone-maker it could face potential 25% tariffs on phones sold to U.S. customers but not manufactured in the country.
Treasury yields eased from multi-month highs, falling 4.4 basis points to 4.509% for the benchmark U.S. 10-year note.
“If I were to put a headline on today’s story, it would be ‘Here We Go Again!’” said James St. Aubin, chief investment officer at Ocean Park Asset Management in Santa Monica, California.
“This is Trump turning on the temperature on the tariff conversation with the EU and Apple. The markets were hoping that the worst was behind us when it comes to the tariff rhetoric. But in reality, there’s still some smoldering embers when it comes to the tariff talk,” St. Aubin added.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 256.02 points, or 0.61%, to 41,603.07, the S&P 500 lost 39.19 points, or 0.67%, to 5,802.82 and the Nasdaq Composite lost 188.53 points, or 1.00%, to 18,737.21.
For the week, the Dow lost 2.47%, the S&P 500 fell 2.61%, and the Nasdaq shed 2.48%.
U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Trump did not believe the EU’s trade offers were of sufficient quality. He also said he hoped the threat of fresh tariffs would “light a fire under the EU” in negotiations.
The S&P/TSX composite index ended up 25.94 points, or 0.1%, at 25,879.95, holding below the record closing high it posted on Tuesday.
For the week, the index was down 0.4%, its first decline after six straight weekly gains.
“We’ve had such a powerful bounce off those lows in April, the market was probably due for some consolidation,” said Greg Taylor, chief investment officer at PenderFund Capital Management. “The big thing to watch is still bond yields ... That’s going to hold the market back from really hitting new highs substantially.”
Domestic data was upbeat. Retail sales rose 0.8% month-over-month in March, beating estimates, and looked set to increase further in April.
The TSX materials group, which includes metal mining shares, advanced 1.3% as the price of gold moved back in reach of its recent record high.
The price of oil also rose, settling 0.5% higher at US$61.53 a barrel, while the energy sector added 0.4%.
Shares of uranium producer Energy Fuels Inc surged 18.1% after Trump signed executive orders seeking to jumpstart the nuclear power industry. Many other uranium stocks were also sharply higher.
Technology was a drag in Toronto, falling 1.4%, and industrials lost 0.7%.
On Wall Street, most megacap and growth stocks fell, including Amazon, Nvidia and Meta Platforms - which all lost more than 1%. Tesla ended down 0.5%.
The CBOE Volatility Index, Wall Street’s “fear gauge,” hit a more than two-week high and finished up 10%. Semiconductor stocks dropped 1.5%.
Deckers Outdoor slumped nearly 20% after the maker of UGG boots forecast first-quarter net sales below estimates and said it would not provide annual targets due to tariff-led macroeconomic uncertainty. Sportswear maker Nike dropped 2.1%.
Volume on U.S. exchanges was 17.67 billion shares, compared with the 17.73 billion average for the full session over the last 20 trading days.
Reuters, Globe staff