Stocks end day mostly up after wild ride

U.S. stocks went on another dizzying ride Friday and worked their way back from an early-morning plunge to send the Standard & Poor’s 500 index to its first gain in four days. It was just the latest swing in a frenetic week for markets around the world as investors recalibrated — again and again — how worried to be about a possible trade war and a more aggressive Federal Reserve.

When U.S. markets opened for trading, the S&P 500 sank as much as 1.1% to join a worldwide sell-off after President Trump doubled down on “trade war” talk. He took to Twitter to defend his Thursday promise to impose stiff tariffs on imports of steel and aluminum, saying that the United States is losing on trade with virtually every country and that “trade wars are good” and “easy to win.”

Investors had a different impression. Markets tumbled in Asia and Europe on fears that escalating retaliation between countries could choke off trade and the global economy. The president of the European Union’s governing body suggested possible tariffs on blue jeans and motorcycles.

The S&P 500 trimmed its loss as the day went on, then bounced between gains and losses. It ended with a gain, as did the Nasdaq composite. The Dow Jones industrial average finished down.

The S&P 500 still ended the week with a loss of 2%, its third decline that severe in the last five weeks. Last year, the worst weekly loss was just 1.4%. The Dow and Nasdaq also ended the week in the red.

Stocks pared their losses as investors questioned how far Trump will end up going with the tariffs, said Brent Schutte, chief investment strategist at Northwestern Mutual Wealth Management. “I view nearly every one of Trump’s actions through a negotiation lens,” he said. “This was an anchor, an opening bid.”

If a trade war does break out, it could threaten a key reason investors were optimistic about stocks coming into 2018: The global economy is finally strengthening in sync, which should lead to higher corporate profits.

Big U.S. companies rely heavily on global trade, and companies in the S&P 500 got 43% of their sales from outside the United States in 2016, according to S&P Dow Jones Indices.

Stocks of smaller U.S. companies, which tend to do more of their business at home, performed much better than the rest of the market Friday.

The trade worries are piling onto a market that was already nervous. Concerns about the possibility of higher inflation and interest rates have rocked markets since the S&P 500 set its latest record high in January.

The yield on the 10-year Treasury rose to 2.86% from 2.81%.

Friday’s biggest loss in the S&P 500 came from Foot Locker, which plunged 12.7% to $40.04 after it said sales trends were weaker last quarter than expected.

McDonald’s dropped 4.8% to $148.27 on fears that its value menu isn’t drumming up much in sales, and an RBC Capital Markets analyst cut his expectations for the chain’s sales in the U.S.

Gap jumped 7.8% to $34.18 after the clothing retailer posted better-thanexpected quarterly results.

Microsemi climbed 4.7% to $67.30 after the Aliso Viejo firm agreed to be bought by Microchip Technology for $68.78 a share, or more than $8 billion.

Benchmark U.S. crude rose 26 cents to settle at $61.25 a barrel. Brent crude rose 54 cents to $64.37 a barrel. Natural gas was flat at $2.70 per 1,000 cubic feet. Heating oil fell a cent to $1.88 a gallon. Wholesale gasoline rose a cent to $1.90 a gallon.

Gold rose $18.20 to settle at $1,323.40 an ounce. Silver rose 19 cents to $16.47 an ounce. Copper rose 2 cents to $3.12 a pound.