Stock market today: Wall Street drifts lower as the Trump trade cools

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Stock market today: Wall Street drifts lower as the Trump trade cools

2024-11-13 05:19 Last Updated At：05:20

NEW YORK (AP) — U.S. stocks drifted lower Tuesday as momentum cooled for the torrid “Trump trade” that swept Wall Street following Donald Trump’s presidential victory.

The S&P 500 slipped 0.3% a day after setting its latest all-time high. The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped 382 points, or 0.9%, and the Nasdaq composite fell 0.1%.

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A pair of traders work in their booth on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, Thursday, Nov. 7, 2024. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)

FILE - A train arrives at a Wall Street subway station in New York's Financial District on Nov. 5, 2024. (AP Photo/Peter Morgan, File)

Currency traders work at the foreign exchange dealing room of the KEB Hana Bank headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, Tuesday, Nov. 12, 2024. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

Currency traders watch monitors near a screen showing the Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI), left, and the foreign exchange rate between U.S. dollar and South Korean won at the foreign exchange dealing room of the KEB Hana Bank headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, Tuesday, Nov. 12, 2024. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

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A pair of traders work in their booth on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, Thursday, Nov. 7, 2024. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)

FILE - A train arrives at a Wall Street subway station in New York's Financial District on Nov. 5, 2024. (AP Photo/Peter Morgan, File)

Currency traders work at the foreign exchange dealing room of the KEB Hana Bank headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, Tuesday, Nov. 12, 2024. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

Currency traders watch monitors near a screen showing the Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI), left, and the foreign exchange rate between U.S. dollar and South Korean won at the foreign exchange dealing room of the KEB Hana Bank headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, Tuesday, Nov. 12, 2024. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

Stocks had been broadly rising since last week on expectations that Trump’s preference for lower tax rates and other policies may mean faster economic growth, as well as bigger U.S. government debt and higher inflation. Some areas of the market rocketed on particularly high-grade fuel, such as smaller U.S. stocks seen as benefiting the most from Trump’s America First ideas.

They gave back some of their big gains Tuesday, and the Russell 2000 index of smaller companies fell a market-leading 1.8%. Even Tesla, which is run by Trump’s ally Elon Musk, sank. It dropped 6.1% for its first loss since before Election Day.

The stock that’s become most entwined with Trump’s popularity, Trump Media & Technology Group, fell 8.8%.

UnitedHealth Group was one of the heaviest weights on the S&P 500 and fell 1.7% after the U.S. Justice Department sued to block its $3.3 billion purchase of Amedisys, saying the deal would hinder access to home health and hospice services. Amedisys sank 1.8%.

A jump in Treasury yields also added pressure on the stock market, as trading of U.S. government bonds resumed following Monday’s Veterans Day holiday. The yield on the 10-year Treasury jumped to 4.42% from 4.31% late Friday, which is a notable move for the bond market.

Treasury yields have been climbing sharply since September, in large part because the U.S. economy has remained much more resilient than feared. The hope is that it can continue to stay solid as the Federal Reserve continues to cut interest rates in order to keep the job market humming, now that it’s helped get inflation nearly down to its 2% target.

Some of the rise in yields has also been because of Trump. He talks up tariffs and other policies that economists say could drive inflation and the U.S. government’s debt higher. That puts upward pressure on Treasury yields and could hinder the Fed’s plans to cut interest rates. While lower rates can boost the economy, they can also give inflation more fuel.

The next update on inflation will arrive Wednesday, when the U.S. government will give the latest reading on prices that U.S. consumers are paying across the country. Economists expect it to show inflation accelerated to 2.6% in October from 2.4% the month before. But they’re also looking for underlying inflation trends, which ignore prices for groceries and fuel that can zigzag sharply from one month to another, to stay steady at 3.3%.

Helping to limit Wall Street’s losses was Live Nation Entertainment, which joined the lengthening list of U.S. companies delivering stronger profit for the summer than analysts expected. The company behind Ticketmaster said concert fans around the world are spending more to hear artists, and it said trends are already encouraging for 2025 stadium tours for Coldplay and others. Its stock rose 4.7%.

Tyson Foods jumped 6.5% after likewise topping analysts’ forecasts for profit. The producer of beef, chicken and pork also raised its dividend for investors.

Home Depot pulled back 1.3% despite beating analysts’ profit expectations, as it continues to contend with a pullback in spending by customers.

All told, the S&P 500 slipped 17.36 points to 5,983.99. The Dow dropped 382.15 to 43,910.98, and the Nasdaq composite fell 17.36 to 19,281.40

Stocks usually rally following close elections, but this spurt is “clearly faster than prior ones,” according to Parag Thatte and other strategists at Deutsche Bank. It has the S&P 500 on track to deliver a return of more than 20% for a second straight year. That’s happened only three times in the past 100 years, according to Deutsche Bank.

In the crypto market, bitcoin soared to another record before pulling back. Trump has embraced cryptocurrencies generally and pledged to make his country the crypto capital of the world. Bitcoin got as high as $89,995, according to CoinDesk, before dipping back toward $89,500. It started the year below $43,000.

In stock markets abroad, indexes fell across much of Europe and Asia. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng dropped 2.8% for one of the worst declines. It closed below the 20,000 level for the first time since China announced a stimulus package in September.

AP Business Writer Yuri Kageyama contributed.

Trump makes a victor's return to Washington and pledges a 'smooth' transition of power from Biden

2024-11-14 01:46 Last Updated At：01:51

WASHINGTON (AP) — Donald Trump made a victor’s return to Washington on Wednesday, visiting the White House for a lengthy meeting with President Joe Biden and committing to a straightforward transition of power as the president-elect moves quickly to build out his new administration.

Sitting in front of a crackling fire in the Oval Office, the former rivals shook hands as reporters looked on. Biden called Trump "Mr. President-elect and former president” before settling on “Donald.”

“Congratulations,” the Democrat told the Republican. “I look forward to having, like they said, a smooth transition,” Biden said. “Welcome. Welcome back.”

Trump replied, “Thank you very much," saying that “politics is tough. And it’s, in many cases, not a very nice world. But it is a nice world today, and I appreciate it very much.”

He said the transition between the outgoing and incoming administrations "will be as smooth as it can get and I very much appreciate that, Joe.” Trump, who has long disputed his 2020 election loss to Biden, did not invite Biden to the White House during the transition four years ago.

The scene put in stark relief the remarkable political rebound for Trump, who departed Washington in January 2021 as a diminished, politically defeated leader after helping incite a mob of his supporters to attack the Capitol. Today, he is preparing to come back to power with what he and his GOP allies see as a mandate for governance.

Neither he nor Biden answered questions shouted by the media after their brief remarks. At one point, Biden looked at Trump, who moved his head to the side and gave a small shrug but did not respond.

Each was joined by his chief of staff for the private meeting that is a traditional part of the peaceful handoff of power, but a ritual that Trump declined to participate in four years ago after losing to Biden.

First lady Jill Biden greeted Trump upon his arrival at the White House and gave him a handwritten letter of congratulations for his wife, Melania Trump, who did not make the trip to Washington. The letter also expressed the first lady's team’s readiness to assist with the transition.

As Trump met with Biden, Trump sent out a fundraising email to supporters saying that he "is inside the White House right now conducting a very important meeting.”

Trump had flown from Florida in the morning, joining up with billionaire Elon Musk for a morning session with House Republicans. That discussion came as Trump prepares for a potentially unified Republican government and sweep of power.

Back in Washington for the first time since his election victory, Trump told the GOP lawmakers, “It’s nice to win.”

He received a standing ovation from House GOP members, many of whom took cellphone videos of Trump as ran through their party's victories up and down the ballot, in what would be, under the constitutional limits, his final presidential election.

“I suspect I won’t be running again unless you say he’s good we got to figure something else,” Trump said to laughter from the lawmakers.

The Constitution's 22nd Amendment prevents presidents from running for a third term.

House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., said of Trump's arrival, “He is the comeback king.”

“We owe him a great debt of gratitude," Johnson said.

Trump's reemergence comes amid Republican congressional leadership elections — with the potential for the president-elect to place his imprint on the outcome. He endorsed Johnson's return to the speaker's office with the president-elect saying he is with Johnson all the way, according to a person familiar with the remarks but not authorized to publicly discuss the private meeting.

Musk joining Trump on the return to Washington comes after the Tesla and SpaceX CEO has been spending much of his time at Mar-a-Lago, Trump's Florida estate, and participating in discussions as the incoming Trump administration prepares to transition from Biden's.

Trump has named Musk to a government efficiency advisory role in his incoming administration. Some close to Trump and his team now see Musk as the second most influential figure in Trump’s immediate orbit, after Susie Wiles, the campaign manager who is Trump's incoming chief of staff.

After his election win in 2016, Trump met with President Barack Obama in the Oval Office and called it “a great honor." But he soon was back to heaping insults on his predecessor.

Biden has continued to lie about widespread voter fraud that did not occur. In addition to not inviting then-president-elect Biden to the White House, Trump left Washington without attending the inauguration. It was the first time that had happened since Andrew Johnson skipped Ulysses S. Grant's swearing-in 155 years ago.

Biden insists that he'll do everything he can to make the transition to the next Trump administration go smoothly. That's despite having spent more than a year campaigning for reelection and decrying Trump as a threat to democracy and the nation’s core values. Biden then bowed out of the race in July and endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris to succeed him.

Traditionally, as the outgoing and incoming presidents meet in the West Wing, the first lady hosts her successor upstairs in the residence, But her office said Melania Trump wasn't attending, saying in a statement that “her husband’s return to the Oval Office to commence the transition process is encouraging, and she wishes him great success.”

When Trump left Washington in 2021, even some top Republicans had begun to decry his role in helping incite the mob that overrand the Capitol mere weeks earlier. But his win in last week's election completes a political comeback that has seen Trump once again become the unchallenged head of the GOP.

Wednesday's trip was not the first time Trump has returned to the Capitol area since the end of his first term, though. Congressional Republicans hosted Trump over the summer, as Trump was again solidifying his dominance over the party.

In last week's election, Republicans wrested the Senate majority from Democrats and are on the cusp of keeping control of the House, are in the midst of their own leadership elections happening behind closed doors Wednesday. Johnson has pulled ever-closer to Trump as he worked to keep his majority — and his own job with the gavel.

It's unclear whether Trump will also visit the Senate, where Republicans chose Sen. John Thune of South Dakota in a three-way race to replace outgoing GOP leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky. Trump's allies were pushing GOP senators to vote for Sen. Rick Scott of Florida.

Associated Press writers Jill Colvin in New York and Farnoush Amiri, Darlene Superville and Kevin Freking contributed to this report.

Stock market today: Wall Street drifts lower as the Trump trade cools

News

Stock market today: Wall Street drifts lower as the Trump trade cools

A pair of traders work in their booth on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, Thursday, Nov. 7, 2024. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)

FILE - A train arrives at a Wall Street subway station in New York's Financial District on Nov. 5, 2024. (AP Photo/Peter Morgan, File)

Currency traders work at the foreign exchange dealing room of the KEB Hana Bank headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, Tuesday, Nov. 12, 2024. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

Currency traders work at the foreign exchange dealing room of the KEB Hana Bank headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, Tuesday, Nov. 12, 2024. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

A pair of traders work in their booth on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, Thursday, Nov. 7, 2024. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)

FILE - A train arrives at a Wall Street subway station in New York's Financial District on Nov. 5, 2024. (AP Photo/Peter Morgan, File)

Currency traders work at the foreign exchange dealing room of the KEB Hana Bank headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, Tuesday, Nov. 12, 2024. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

Currency traders work at the foreign exchange dealing room of the KEB Hana Bank headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, Tuesday, Nov. 12, 2024. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

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