US pre-open: Futures higher following three-day tariff rout
By Iain Gilbert
Date: Tuesday 08 Apr 2025
(Sharecast News) - Wall Street futures were firmly in the green ahead of the bell on Tuesday as major indices looked set to reclaim some of their post-'Liberation Day' losses.
As of 1300 BST, Dow Jones futures were up 2.68%, while S&P 500 and Nasdaq-100 futures had the indices opening 2.28% and 2.13% firmer, respectively.
The Dow closed 349.26 points lower on Monday, with the blue-chip index swinging a massive 2,595 points between session highs and lows as Donald Trump's newly announced tariff policies continued to weigh on sentiment.
Tariffs remain in focus on Tuesday after Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent indicated that negotiations with other nations could last until June, noting that "maybe almost 70" countries, including Japan, had already contacted the White House in order to hold discussions.
Trade Nation's David Morrison said: "It seems clear that president Trump is not going to back down on his randomly-calculated reciprocal tariffs just because markets are suffering conniptions. That would make him look weak. He also reacted aggressively to China's own reciprocal tariffs on US imports by upping levies on Chinese goods. These are now at such ridiculous levels that they don't make practicable sense.
"Overall, it's understandable that the US would want to level up trade through tariffs. But Trump's approach is so scattergun, his targets so bizarre, the size of tariffs so egregious and the aims so opaque (fentanyl, migration, fairness?) In the absence of some tariff clarity and defined purpose from the White House, and soon, the Trump administration is in great danger of losing control. If markets perceive this, which they are close to doing, then the derisking will continue. If so, then the danger is that something fundamental to the financial plumbing breaks. That is not a risk that anyone should be taking with the global economy. Particularly given the parlous geopolitical state the world is in currently."
On the macro front, optimism levels among US small businesses dropped to a five-month low in March, as Washington's new trade policies clouded the sales outlook for firms. The small business optimism index from the National Federation of Independent Business fell by 3.3 points to 97.4 last month - below the 51-year average of 98 and the lowest print since October 2024. A net 21% of business owners said they expected better business conditions, down from 37% in February, marking the largest monthly decline since December 2020. The proportion citing taxes as their top business issue rose two points to 18%, its highest level in more than three years, while 16% said inflation was their single most important problem, unchanged from February.
Reporting by Iain Gilbert at Sharecast.com
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