NEW YORK — U.S. stocks climbed again Monday as Wall Street’s wild roller-coaster ride veers back upward.
The Standard & Poor’s 500 index rose 0.6% for a second straight gain after it fell 10% below its record late last week. The Dow Jones industrial average climbed 0.9%, and the Nasdaq composite added 0.3%.
More big swings could be ahead, with a decision by the Federal Reserve on interest rates coming later in the week and worries continuing about President Trump’s trade war.
Stocks have been mostly tumbling on worries that Trump’s rat-a-tat announcements on tariffs and other policies are creating so much uncertainty that they’ll push U.S. households and businesses to freeze their spending, which would hurt the economy. Surveys have shown sharp drops in confidence, and some companies are warning about changes in behavior from their customers.
A report Monday said U.S. retailers broadly saw weaker revenue last month than economists expected, but it may not have been quite as bad as it seemed on the surface.
Much of the shortfall in growth versus expectations was due to weaker-than-forecast sales of automobiles and lower fuel costs. Outside of those, the performance was closer to expectations.
Treasury yields initially rose immediately after the report’s release. That’s often an indication of firming confidence among bond investors about the strength of the U.S. economy, though yields quickly yo-yoed afterward through the day.
“In our view, this morning’s February retail sales report offers evidence of a limited, modest economic slowdown, rather than signaling a gathering recession,” said Jennifer Timmerman, investment strategy analyst at Wells Fargo Investment Institute.
It’s a sharp turnaround for investors even to be talking about a possible recession after the U.S. economy closed last year running at a solid rate. Excitement at the time also was building about policies coming from Trump to accelerate growth. Hiring still remains relatively healthy, and that could help keep the economy growing. But the talk about recession by itself could sap confidence.
That’s the precarious stage onto which Federal Reserve Chair Jerome H. Powell will step Wednesday when he announces the Fed’s latest decision on interest rates.
Virtually no one expects the Fed to make a move Wednesday. The central bank has been keeping rates steady this year, preferring to see how conditions play out. Heading into the end of last year, it had been cutting rates sharply in hopes of relaxing pressure on the U.S. economy after high inflation had eased.
Wall Street’s focus will be on what Powell says about the rest of the year. Expectations are still high that the Fed will cut its main interest rate two or three times in 2025. The risk of cutting interest rates too quickly or aggressively is that it could push up inflation. But keeping rates too high for too long also could create unnecessary pain for the economy by slowing borrowing and overall activity.
On Wall Street, Intel climbed 6.8% to extend its gains after the chip company named former board member and semiconductor industry veteran Lip-Bu Tan as its chief executive last week.
PepsiCo added 1.9% after saying it agreed to buy Poppi, a prebiotic soda brand, for a net $1.65 billion.
They helped offset a 4.8% drop for Tesla. The electric-vehicle company’s stock has been struggling this year amid worries that its brand has become too intertwined with Elon Musk, who has been leading efforts to cut spending by the U.S. government. Tesla vehicles and dealerships have become targets of people unhappy with Trump and his policies.
All told, the S&P 500 rose 36.18 points to 5,675.12. The Dow gained 353.44 points to 41,841.63, and the Nasdaq composite climbed 54.58 points to 17,808.66.
In the bond market, Treasury yields were mixed. The yield on the 10-year Treasury went from 4.28% shortly before the release of the retail sales report to nearly 4.33% immediately afterward. It then pulled back to 4.29%, down from 4.31% late Friday.
In stock markets abroad, indexes rose across much of Europe and Asia.
Chinese markets rose after the government reported stronger than expected factory data. Later Monday, officials briefed reporters about Beijing’s efforts to get consumers to spend more, seen as key to getting the economy out of its doldrums.
Stocks rose 0.8% in Hong Kong and 0.2% in Shanghai. Stock markets outside the United States have been beating Wall Street this year, flipping the leaderboard after years of U.S. dominance.
Choe writes for the Associated Press.
