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Trump comments on China keep market trading choppy

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Ulta Beauty ( ULTA ) gains after raising annual profit forecast

(Updates to close)

By Caroline Valetkevitch

NEW YORK May 30 (Reuters) -

The S&P 500 ended a volatile session nearly flat on Friday

as U.S. President Donald Trump slammed China before sounding

upbeat about reaching a trade deal, but the benchmark index

closed out its best month since November 2023.

The Nasdaq also registered its biggest monthly

percentage gain since November 2023.

Trump's post on his Truth Social platform said China had

breached an agreement with the U.S. to mutually roll back

tariffs and trade restrictions for critical minerals, and issued

a new veiled threat to get tougher with Beijing. He did not

specify how China had violated the agreement.

Stocks pared losses as Trump said on Friday afternoon he

will speak to China's President Xi Jinping and hopefully work

out their differences on trade and tariffs.

Tim Ghriskey, senior portfolio strategist at Ingalls &

Snyder in New York, said tariffs remain an issue for the market.

"The U.S-China trade talks supposedly have stalled

again, and yet they have a meeting coming up as well," he said.

According to preliminary data, the S&P 500

lost 4.97 points, or 0.06%, to end at 5,907.20 points,

while the Nasdaq Composite lost 62.11 points, or 0.32%,

to 19,113.77. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 27.26

points, or 0.06%, to 42,242.99.

May was a volatile month for stocks as Trump's erratic

trade policies kept investors on edge, but his softening tariff

stance, along with upbeat earnings and tame inflation data,

helped the S&P 500 rebound from its April lows.

Investors on Friday also digested data showing U.S. consumer

spending increased 2.1% year-on-year in April after advancing

2.3% in March. The Federal Reserve tracks the PCE price measures

for its 2% inflation target.

Traders maintained bets that the U.S. central bank would cut

its target for short-term borrowing costs in September.

While

the effective

U.S. tariff on imports was between 2% and 3% before Trump

took office, it stands at about 15%, according to Oxford

Research estimates. This would have been lowered to about 6% by

a trade court ruling, but an appeals court's emergency stay has

kept the higher rate in place for now.

Among other big movers on the day, Ulta Beauty ( ULTA )

jumped after the cosmetics retailer raised its annual profit

forecast after beating quarterly results.

(Additional reporting by Shashwat Chauhan and Kanchana

Chakravarty in Bengaluru; Additional reporting by Ragini Mathur;

Editing by Maju Samuel and Devika Syamnath and Richard Chang)