Wall Street metaphorically hoisted Jerome Powell on its shoulders while...
Wall Street metaphorically hoisted Jerome Powell on its shoulders while singing “For He’s a Jolly Good Fellow” yesterday by sending stocks soaring as soon as the Fed chair hinted in his Jackson Hole speech that interest rate cuts are likely coming in September (more on that below). The Dow clinched its first record close of the year, and rate-sensitive tech stocks, which had been having a rough week, came roaring back, with Nvidia, Alphabet, Amazon, Meta, and Tesla all rising.
Fed Chair Jerome Powell received a standing ovation on stage in Jackson Hole, WY, while delivering his highly anticipated speech at an annual gathering of central bankers yesterday, and that was before he intimated that the Federal Reserve could cut interest rates as soon as next month.
Taking a break from leaving President Trump on read, JPow told the assembled crowd, “With policy in restrictive territory, the baseline outlook and the shifting balance of risks may warrant adjusting our policy stance.” That’s as close as Powell gets to saying rate cuts are likely. Odds of a rate cut at the Fed’s next meeting on Sept. 16–17 now sit just above 83%, per FedWatch.
Canada drops retaliatory tariffs on billions’ worth of U.S. products
It’s August, so there’s finally something thawing...
It’s August, so there’s finally something thawing in Canada: Prime Minister Mark Carney said the country would drop its recently imposed 25% tariffs on goods covered by the United States-Mexico-Canada trade pact as of Sept. 1, bringing them more in line with what the US has put on Canadian goods. The move to drop import duties on ~$21 billion worth of American goods came a day after Carney spoke to President Trump and was widely interpreted as a gesture of goodwill to try to lay the groundwork for future trade talks. But it’s not all as friendly as Canada is reputed to be—Carney noted that high tariffs would remain for now on US steel, aluminum, and automobiles.
The US now owns 10% of Intel. It’s official: The...
The US now owns 10% of Intel. It’s official: The government has taken the highly unusual step of owning a piece of the beleaguered chipmaker. President Trump said the deal came out of his meeting with the company’s CEO, whom he’d previously called on to step down over his ties to China. “They’ve agreed to do it, and I think it’s a great deal for them,” Trump told reporters yesterday before Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick announced the deal was done. The move comes as the latest intervention by Trump’s government into the private sector, after taking a “golden share” in the US-Nippon Steel merger and taking a cut of sales to China by other semiconductor makers.
National Guard troops patrolling in Washington, DC, as part of President Trump’s crackdown on the city have been ordered to start carrying guns by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.
A UN-backed group that’s considered to be the world’s authority on food crises said that Gaza City and the surrounding areas are experiencing a famine that will spread unless Israel’s restrictions on aid are lifted. UN Chief António Guterres called it a “man-made disaster,” but Israel rejected the finding as “an outright lie.”
Ghislaine Maxwell said she never saw Donald Trump misbehave in transcripts of her recent meetings with Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, which were released by the Justice Department yesterday.
A federal judge left the immigration detention center known as “Alligator Alcatraz” open for now, but ruled that due to environmental concerns, no new detainees could be brought in, no new construction could start, and construction changes must occur that could force it to shut down.
Waymo got approval to start testing its self-driving vehicles in New York City
Stocks end sharply higher after Powell opens door to rate cut in Jackson Hole
The U.S. stock market closed sharply higher Friday, as...
The U.S. stock market closed sharply higher Friday, as investors cheered the potential for interest rate cuts following Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell’s speech at the Jackson Hole Economic Policy Symposium.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average rallied 1.9%, while the S&P 500 climbed 1.5% and the Nasdaq Composite jumped 1.9%, according to preliminary data from FactSet. The S&P 500 ended slightly below its all-time closing high of 6,468.54 on Aug. 14, with Friday’s stock-market rally lifting the index to a modest gain for the week.
Powell’s Jackson Hole speech on monetary policy sparked optimism on Wall Street that the Fed may cut its benchmark interest rate at its policy meeting in September. Ahead of his Friday speech, the S&P 500 had stumbled this week as investors rotated out of Big Tech stocks.
The S&P 500 finished Friday with a weekly gain of 0.3%, while the Dow advanced 1.5% for the week. The tech-heavy Nasdaq saw a weekly loss of 0.6%, the preliminary FactSet data show.
Strong Asian demand and West Texas Intermediate's discount to Middle...
Strong Asian demand and West Texas Intermediate's discount to Middle Eastern grades are fueling a rebound in US crude exports, which are on track to exceed 4 million barrels per day in August and September, the most since the beginning of the year. After a summer of heavy refinery runs, maintenance downtime and efforts to avoid Texas' year-end ad valorem tax are expected to keep shipments to Asia firm through October.
