Wall Street gains ground after shaking off four-week losing streak

Stocks closed broadly higher Monday amid hopes on Wall Street that the Trump administration may take a more targeted approach because it tees up a recent round of tariffs on imported goods next week.

The S&P 500 jumped 1.8%. The index was coming off its first winning week after a four-week losing streak.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 1.4%, and the Nasdaq composite closed 2.3% higher.

“The market was primed to reply well if the administration pulled back on a number of the tariff threats and even provided off ramps for the tensions, and that’s form of what we’re seeing here,” said Ross Mayfield, investment strategist at Baird.

Despite the gains, the benchmark S&P 500 has lost 1.9% thus far this 12 months out of concerns that a trade war could hinder economic growth and increase inflationary pressures.

Wall Street stays focused on how tariffs could eventually impact inflation, consumer spending and economic growth. Stocks have been riding waves of hope and worry as tariffs are announced, then either implemented or pulled. A recent round of tariffs scheduled to be implemented on April 2 may be softened or postponed somewhat than take effect.

Trump has been somewhat closely guarded about his plans for tariffs, saying Monday that though he desires to charge “reciprocal” rates — import taxes to match the rates charged by other countries — that “we may be even nicer than that.”

“The precise breadth and scale of the tariffs remain to be seen, and a cycle of tit-for-tat escalation can also be possible within the weeks following the announcement, potentially triggering further bouts of market volatility,” said Ulrike Hoffmann-Burchardi, chief investment officer of world equities at UBS Global Wealth Management.

Gains on Monday were broad, with 84% of stocks inside the S&P 500 ending higher. Nearly every sector inside the index rose.

Technology stocks helped prepared the ground. The sector has been the driving force behind much of the broader markets movement, whether up or down. The stocks are among the many most precious on Wall Street and are likely to have an outsized impact on the broader market’s direction.

Nvidia rose 3.2% and Apple added 1.1%.

Tesla climbed 11.9% for the most important gain amongst S&P 500 stocks. The electrical vehicle maker continues to be down about 31% for the 12 months. It has been struggling on worries that customers are turned off by CEO Elon Musk’s leading efforts to slash spending by the U.S. government.

Genetics testing company 23andme lost greater than half its value after it announced over the weekend that it had initiated voluntary bankruptcy proceedings.

AZEK Co. jumped 17.3% after the constructing materials company announced it was being bought by Australia’s James Hardie Industries in a cash-and-stock deal valued around $8.75 billion.

It is the second large deal within the sector in lower than every week, with QXO Inc. announcing on Thursday that it was buying Beacon Roofing Supply Inc. in a deal price about $11 billion, including debt.

All told, the S&P 500 rose 100.01 points to five,767.57. The Dow gained 597.97 points to 42,583,32. The Nasdaq rose 404.54 points to 18,188.59.

Within the bond market, Treasury yields rose. The yield on the 10-year Treasury rose to 4.34% from 4.25% late Friday.

Markets in Europe mostly closed lower, while indexes in Asia were mixed.

Chinese Premier Li Qiang struck a conciliatory tone during a gathering with business leaders and U.S. Senator Steve Daines, a robust supporter of President Donald Trump, who’s the primary member of Congress to go to Beijing since Trump took office in January.

Wall Street has several economic updates this week. Business group The Conference Board releases its consumer confidence survey for March on Tuesday. Wall Street expects the survey to indicate a slight dip in consumer confidence.

On Friday, the U.S. government releases the private consumption expenditures price index for February. It’s a measure of inflation closely watched by the Federal Reserve.

Recent economic reports have shown that the underlying economy stays strong, but that buyers have gotten more nervous and cautious. They’ve also shown that inflation stays stubborn.

Stubborn inflation has prompted more caution from the Fed, which began cutting its benchmark rate of interest at the tip of 2024. Those cuts got here after the central bank raised rates of interest to be able to cool inflation from a two-decade high.

Several measures of inflation show that rates of interest remain just above the Fed’s goal of two%. The U.S. trade war with its key trading partners has threatened to reignite inflation and the Fed is holding off on further cutting rates of interest to see how inflation and the broader economy reacts.

Lower rates of interest can ease borrowing costs and help give the economy a lift, but they may also push inflation higher.

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Jiang Junzhe and Matt Ott contributed to this report.