The S&P 500 ended Tuesday's choppy session slightly lower as investors waited for clarity on U.S. trade policy after President Donald Trump's latest tariff threats dampened hopes around talks with some trade partners.
Market Snapshot
The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 165.60 points, or 0.37%, to 44,240.76, the S&P 500 lost 4.46 points, or 0.07%, to 6,225.52 and the Nasdaq Composite gained 5.95 points, or 0.03%, to 20,418.46.
Market Movers
Tesla rose 1.3% after falling 6.8% on Monday. Shares have declined 25% this year. CEO Elon Musk announced over the weekend that he would form a new political party, and his return to politics prompted investors to sell the stock. Musk strongly opposed Trump's tax-and-spending bill that was signed into law Friday. The legislation removes purchase tax credits worth up to $7,500 for qualifying electric vehicles.
Amazon.com fell 1.8%. Amazon founder Jeff Bezos sold nearly three million shares worth $665.8 million over two days in July, a regulatory filing Tuesday showed.
Shares of Exxon Mobil rose 2.8%, even after the energy giant warned that second-quarter earnings could take a hit of $800,000 to $1.2 billion from lower crude prices and $300,000 to $700,000 from lower gas prices.
Sunrun fell 11%, Enphase Energy was down 3.6%, and First Solar declined 6.5% after the White House said it would " rapidly eliminate the market distortions and costs imposed on taxpayers by so-called 'green' energy subsidies." Sunrun was upgraded to Sector Weight from Underweight at KeyBanc and Enphase Energy was downgraded to Hold from Buy at TD Cowen.
Moderna, up 8.8%, was the best-performing stock in the S&P 500.
Fair Isaac sank 8.9%. Bill Pulte, the director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, said Tuesday on social media that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac will allow lenders to use the VantageScore 4.0 credit scoring model. Credit bureaus Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion are the creators of VantageScore.
Datadog slipped 4.5% after it was downgraded to Sell from Neutral at Guggenheim with a $105 price target. The analysts said they made the call "ahead of potential significant optimization by OpenAI, which we believe is Datadog's largest customer." Guggenheim said its "tactical positioning is based on our belief that OpenAI's observability software road map is shifting towards more cost efficient, in-house managed technologies, and our model setup that indicates 2H risk."
SoFi Technologies gained 3.7% after the fintech expanded access to alternative investments to include new private markets funds from asset management firms like Cashmere, Fundrise, and Liberty Street Advisors.
Nvidia rose 1.1%. The maker of artificial-intelligence chips declined 0.7% on Monday and ended the session with a market capitalization of $3.861 trillion.
Merit Medical Systems said it expects second-quarter revenue of $380 million to $384 million, better than analysts' forecasts of $372.5 million, and named Martha Aronson as chief executive and president. She will succeed Fred Lampropoulos, who founded the company in 1987 and has been chief executive since then. Shares climbed 4.6%.
Market News
Trump says he will impose 50% tariff on copper imports
President Donald Trump said he will impose a 50% tariff on copper imports on Tuesday, and suggested more steep sector-specific duties are on the way.
“Today, we’re doing copper,” Trump said during a Cabinet meeting at the White House. “I believe the tariff on copper, we’re going to make it 50%.” He did not say specifically when that tariff would take effect.
Trump threatens to impose up to 200% tariff on pharmaceuticals ‘very soon’
President Donald Trump on Tuesday threatened to impose up to 200% tariffs on pharmaceuticals imported into the U.S. “very soon.”
“They’re going to be tariffs at very high rate, like 200%,” Trump said during a Cabinet meeting.
But he suggested that those levies would not go into effect immediately, saying he will “give people about a year, year and a half.”
