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Tuesday starts run of key economic data, earnings season
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Nasdaq posts seventh record close since June 27
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Crypto stocks jump as Bitcoin hits $120,000 mark
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Waters to merge with Becton's diagnostics arm, shares fall
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Indexes up: Dow 0.2%, S&P 500 0.14%, Nasdaq 0.27%
(Updates with closing prices)
By David French
July 14 (Reuters) - Wall Street stocks closed marginally
up on Monday as investors sidestepped any meaningful moves
following U.S. President Donald Trump's latest tariff threats,
and held steady ahead of a busy week of economic data and the
start of earnings season.
Trump ramped up trade tensions over the weekend, vowing to
slap a 30% tariff on most imports from the European Union and
Mexico starting August 1 - leaving the clock ticking for
last-minute trade deals.
The EU extended its pause on retaliatory measures until
early August, holding out hope for a negotiated truce. The White
House said talks with the EU, Canada and Mexico are still
underway.
Despite the headlines, investor reaction was muted, having
grown numb to Trump's barrage of tariff threats and his frequent
last-minute U-turns.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 88.14 points,
or 0.20%, to 44,459.65, the S&P 500 gained 8.81 points,
or 0.14%, at 6,268.56 and the Nasdaq Composite advanced
54.80 points, or 0.27%, to 20,640.33.
Trading volume was also subdued, with 15.43 billion
shares changing hands, compared with the 17.62 billion average
for the last 20 trading days.
Markets have been buoyant in recent weeks even as Trump has
rattled his tariff saber.
The Nasdaq Composite ended at a record high, its
seventh such achievement since June 27. The S&P 500,
which finished a dozen points below last Thursday's best ever
close, has had five records in the same timeframe.
"If anything is holding the market back, it's the fact we've
had a pretty good run since April," said Jason Pride, chief of
investment strategy & research at Glenmede.
He noted that despite initial fears that Trump's tariff
policy would hurt the U.S. economy, the levies unveiled so far
and the passage of his signature economic legislation last week
will broadly offset each other, meaning investors are starting
to be more confident about the economy's growth prospects.
Signs of how Trump's policies are playing out will come this
week, with a raft of new reports on the state of the U.S.
economy due up.
Second-quarter earnings season kicks off on Tuesday, when
several Wall Street banking heavyweights are set to report.
Tuesday is also the scheduled release of the latest consumer
price data, which is expected to reveal an inflation uptick in
June as sellers started passing on the cost of sweeping tariffs.
Wednesday's producer and import price reports will offer
fresh insight into how supply chain pressures are shaping up.
One place where Trump's tariff rhetoric still moved markets
was crude prices, with U.S. benchmark oil dropping 2.2% after he
threatened levies on buyers of Russian exports, which may have
knock-on effects on global energy supplies.
This pushed the energy index down 1.2%, the biggest
decliner among the 11 S&P sectors.
A majority of the sectors closed in positive territory
though, led by the 0.7% advance by communication services
. It was helped by gains in Netflix ( NFLX ), which
reports earnings on Thursday, and Warner Bros. Discovery ( WBD )
, whose latest Superman caper had a strong opening
weekend at the box office.
Crypto stocks ticked up after Bitcoin topped $120,000
for the first time. Coinbase rose 1.8%, and
MicroStrategy ( MSTR ) gained 3.8%.
Waters Corp ( WAT ) dropped 13.8% after the lab equipment
maker agreed to merge with rival Becton, Dickinson and Company's ( BDX )
Biosciences & Diagnostic Solutions unit in a $17.5
billion deal.