Stocks fell for a fifth-straight day Friday, with the S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite suffering their worst weekly losses since the depths of the December slump.
If there was good news for stocks it was that buying kicked in after President Donald Trump softened his threat to impose 10% tariffs on Chinese exports to the United States in September. If there's proof China is, in fact, buying agricultural and other products, the United States might not impose the tariffs, he said in a CNBC interview.
The S&P 500 was down 0.73% on the day. The Nasdaq Composite was down 1.32%, and the Dow Jones industrials fell 0.37%. The Dow had been down as many as 311 points early in the day.
The NASDAQ 100, a more concentrated list, was off 1.4%, with Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL), Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN), Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT), Cisco Systems (NASDAQ:CSCO), Facebook (NASDAQ:FB) and Google parent Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL) contributing half the point loss on the day.
The S&P 500 and Nasdaq declines were their fifth in a row. The Dow's decline was its fourth straight.
The S&P 500 finished down 3.1% for the week. The Nasdaq dropped 3.9%. The Dow's decline was 2.6%.
The declines exploded Wednesday after Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell suggested in a news conference that the Fed's quarter-point rate cut might be a one-time event. He tried to take it back, but the rout was on.
The selling erupted again Thursday after Trump tweeted his threat to impose more retaliatory tariffs on China and continued into Friday until he tried to soften his vow in the CNBC interview.
Oil prices recovered from a big selloff Thursday. Interest rates were lower, with the 10-Year Treasury yield falling to 1.855% from 1.892% on Thursday.
