Wall Street is falling again Tuesday as U.S. households get more pessimistic about the economy because of inflation, tariffs and other policies coming from Washington.
The S&P 500 was down 1% in morning trading. It’s coming off a three-day losing streak after setting an all-time high last week. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 138 points, or 0.3%, as of 10:30 a.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 1.9% lower.
The U.S. stock market has been sinking since the middle of last week after several weaker-than-expected reports on the economy thudded onto Wall Street. On Tuesday, the latest report said confidence among U.S. consumers is falling by more than economists expected.
To be sure, the U.S. economy still appears to be in remarkably solid shape, with growth continuing at the moment. But for the first time since June, a measure of consumers’ short-term expectations fell below a threshold that usually signals a recession ahead, according to the Conference Board. The increase in pessimism was broad based and carried across all kinds of households, whether by age or incomes.
“There was a sharp increase in the mentions of trade and tariffs, back to a level unseen since 2019,” according to Stephanie Guichard, senior economist, global indicators at the Conference Board. “Most notably, comments on the current administration and its policies dominated the responses.”
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