Markets Overview

  • ASX SPI 200 futures down 0.8% to 7,820.00
  • Dow Average down 1.0% to 41,474.20
  • Aussie up 0.4% to 0.6300 per US$
  • US 10-year yield rose 6.4bps to 4.2779%
  • Australia 3-year bond yield fell 7.5 bps to 3.74%
  • Australia 10-year bond yield fell 6.1 bps to 4.38%
  • Gold spot up 1.0% to $2,919.04
  • Brent futures up 0.8% to $69.82/bbl

Economic Events

  • 11:00: (AU) Australia to Sell A$800 Million 3.5% 2034 Bonds

Stocks climbed in late hours after President Donald Trump said he doesn’t see a US economic recession, downplaying Wall Street’s jitters around his trade war.

“I don’t see it at all. I think this country’s going to boom,” Trump said at the White House. He added that markets “are going to go up and they’re going to go down. But you know what, we have to rebuild our country.”

A $600 billion exchange-traded fund tracking the S&P 500 (SPY) rose after the close of regular trading. The White House said 25% tariffs on steel and aluminum would take effect on Canada and other nations, as Trump backed off a threat to impose 50% duties on the largest US trading partner’s metals.

That all happened after stocks hit the lowest level since September, with the benchmark gauge ending 9.3% below its all-time high — after briefly crossing the threshold of a correction.

Wall Street is growing angsty as investors become increasingly unnerved by whipsawing tariff policy, sticky inflation and the unknown pace of the Federal Reserve’s interest-rate easing. Market forecasters at banks including JPMorgan Chase & Co. and RBC Capital Markets have tempered bullish calls for 2025 as Trump’s tariffs stoke fears of slowing economic growth.

“What Trump has been doing has not been helpful for US equity markets,” said Neil Dutta at Renaissance Macro Research. “For now, I don’t see recession. We’ve never really had a recession from policy uncertainty itself. And, we don’t yet know how markets would respond if Trump’s escalation now results in de-escalation later.”

Just minutes after erasing a 1.5% slide on hopes for a Ukraine-Russia truce, the S&P 500 resumed its slide — finishing 0.8% lower. While a rebound in megacaps like Tesla Inc. and Nvidia Corp. drove the market away from session lows, the vast majority of shares retreated. The Nasdaq 100 slid 0.3%. The Dow Jones Industrial Average sank 1.1%.

The yield on 10-year Treasuries advanced six basis points to 4.28%. The Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index fell 0.4%.