Wall Street today: S&P 500 falls toward worst loss since Election Day dragged by vaccine makers | Stock Market News

US stocks are falling Friday toward their worst loss since Election Day as the big bump Wall Street got from last week’s victory for Donald Trump and cut to interest rates by the Federal Reserve keeps fading. The S&P 500 sank 1.1 per cent and was heading for a losing week and its worst day since October. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 250 points, or 0.6 per cent, as of 11:15 am Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 1.9 per cent lower.

Vaccine makers helped drag the market down after President-elect Donald Trump said he wanted Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a prominent anti-vaccine activist, to be his Secretary of Health and Human Services. Moderna tumbled 7.4 per cent, and Pfizer fell 3.6 per cent amid concerns about a possible hit to profits.

Kennedy still needs Senate confirmation to get the job, and some analysts are sceptical about his chances because of his views on vaccines and criticism of the pharmaceutical industry. “However, if Kennedy is confirmed, it is hard to bookend risks for investors as his views are so outside the traditional Republican health policy orthodoxy,” Raymond James analyst Chris Meekins wrote in a research note. 

Meekins is a former deputy assistant secretary at the department known as HHS. “Investors may need to forget everything they thought they knew about Republicans and healthcare,” he said. “Kennedy’s appointment may make it less likely traditional qualified experienced (Republican) staff will agree to join HHS, creating more uncertainty.”

The only stock in the S&P 500 that fell more than Moderna was Applied Materials, which dropped 8.5 per cent even though it reported a stronger profit for the latest quarter than analysts expected. The provider of manufacturing equipment and services to the semiconductor industry gave a forecasted range for upcoming revenue whose midpoint was short of analysts’ expectations.

Companies are under pressure to deliver big growth, in part because their stock prices have been rising so much faster than their earnings. That’s made the broad stock market look more expensive by a range of measures, which has critics calling for at least a fade. Despite this week’s weakness, the S&P 500 is still up more than 23 per cent for the year and near its all-time high set a few days ago.

Stocks had been broadly roaring since Election Day when Trump’s victory sent a jolt through financial markets worldwide. Investors immediately began buying up stocks of banks, smaller US companies, and cryptocurrencies as they bet on the winners resulting from Trump’s preference for higher tariffs, lower tax rates, and lighter regulation.

However, investors also consider the potential downsides of Trump’s return to the White House. Besides Friday’s hit to vaccine makers, Treasury yields have been climbing in the bond market due to the economy’s surprising resilience and worries that Trump’s policies could spur bigger US government deficits and faster inflation.

That’s forced traders to recalibrate how much relief the Federal Reserve could provide for the economy next year through cuts to interest rates. Earlier this month, the Fed lowered its main interest rate for the second time this year, and past forecasts published by Fed officials indicated that more cuts were likely to come through 2025.

Lower interest rates can fuel the economy and stock market, particularly after the Fed kept rates at a two-decade high, but they can also put upward pressure on inflation. On Thursday, Fed Chair Jerome Powell suggested the US central bank will be cautious about future decisions on interest rates. 

“The economy is not sending any signals that we need to be in a hurry to lower rates,” he said, though he declined to discuss how Trump’s policies could alter things. Traders have since ratcheted back forecasts for whether the Fed will cut rates again at its meeting next month, but they still see better than a coin flip’s chance, according to data from CME Group.

Treasury yields were mixed in the bond market on Friday following several economic reports. One showed shoppers spent more at US retailers last month than expected, another signal that the most influential force on the economy remains solid.

“Many consumers were reporting that they were putting off trips and big ticket item purchases until after the election,” according to Brian Jacobsen, chief economist at Annex Wealth Management. “Many businesses reported putting off capital investment due to the election. Now that the uncertainty of the outcome is behind us, we could see some decent ‘relief spending.’”

However, Friday’s data on retail sales may not be as strong as it appeared. After excluding automobile purchases, retail sales were weaker last month than economists expected. A separate report, meanwhile, showed manufacturing activity in New York state is growing strongly. That soundly beat expectations for zero growth, and it comes off October’s contraction. Some of the survey’s responses were collected after Election Day.

In the bond market, the 10-year Treasury yield rose to 4.46 per cent from 4.44 per cent late Thursday. The two-year yield, which more closely tracks expectations for Fed action, slipped to 4.32 per cent from 4.36 per cent late Thursday.

In stock markets abroad, London’s FTSE 100 fell 0.1 per cent after data from the Office for National Statistics showed economic growth slowed to 0.1 per cent in the July-September quarter from 0.5 per cent in the previous quarter. It was weaker than expected. Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 gained 0.3 per cent after data showed that Japan’s economy accelerated in the latest quarter, even as the Bank of Japan raised interest rates in July.