In yet ANOTHER self-imposed wound, the U.S. markets took it on the chin this week thanks to the ham-handed and seemingly not-considered-at-all trade policy shift from the Trump administration.
Part of the concern driving the drop–besides the basic expectation that tariffs against the U.S.’s largest trading partners will actually result in higher prices for Americans at the very same time they are being laid off from their manufacturing and building jobs due to the new tariffs–is that there seems to be no consistency within the Trump administration, or communicated out from it.
When policy affecting a significant chunk of the economy is seemingly decided between FOX and Friends commercial break tweet-storms, markets have little confidence in the reliability of factors which affect them.
On Thursday, 29 out of 30 companies on the Dow lost ground.
Caterpillar was the worst performer, shedding 2%. Caterpillar executive Amy Campbell warned in March that tariffs would be a “negative” for selling the company’s construction and mining equipment overseas.