Author: News Room

The U.S. stock market is headed for one of its worst weeks in many months, after a series of dizzying policy shifts on tariffs from the White House. A fresh jobs report on Friday will provide a crucial reading on the strength of the economy, which has become a growing worry for investors.Futures on the S&P 500 pointed to a subdued start to trading when markets open. The benchmark index has already dropped 3.6 percent so far this week, its worst week since September. It is on course for its third consecutive week of losses, a sharp mood shift since…

Meltdown The markets have spoken.The S&P 500 is on track for its worst weekly loss since the collapse of the Silicon Valley Bank crisis two years ago. And investors have wiped out post-Election Day gains as President Trump’s dizzying start-stop tariff policy fuels volatility on trading floors and in boardrooms.Another test comes this morning with the jobs report due out at 8:30 a.m. Eastern. It’s expected to show solid growth in hiring even as federal workers brace for mass layoffs. Economic alarm bells are ringing elsewhere. Mohamed El-Erian and Ed Yardeni, two longtime market watchers, see a downturn in the…

March 7, 2025, 5:56 a.m. ETThe recent sell-off has been driven by declines in the stocks of big technology companies.Credit…Lucas Jackson/ReutersThe U.S. stock market is headed for one of its worst weeks in many months, after a series of dizzying policy shifts on tariffs from the White House. A fresh jobs report on Friday will provide a crucial reading on the strength of the economy, which has become a growing worry for investors.Futures on the S&P 500 pointed to a subdued start to trading when markets open. The benchmark index has already dropped 3.6 percent so far this week, its…

This article is part of a Women and Leadership special report highlighting women who are charting new pathways and fighting for opportunities for women and others.Last year, $178 billion in venture capital was invested in U.S. companies, but only 19 percent of those investment decisions were made by women, according to the capital markets database Pitchbook.Just two percent of that funding went to companies founded by women. This imbalance — which has persisted for decades — is what motivated Trish Costello to start Portfolia in 2014, a venture capital investment platform geared toward women and one of the first venture…

President Trump inherited an economy that was, by most conventional measures, firing on all cylinders. Wages, consumer spending and corporate profits were rising. Unemployment was low. The inflation rate, though higher than normal, was falling.Just weeks into Mr. Trump’s term, the outlook is gloomier. Measures of business and consumer confidence have plunged. The stock market has been on a roller-coaster ride. Layoffs are picking up, according to some data. And forecasters are cutting their estimates for economic growth this year, with some even predicting that the U.S. gross domestic product could shrink in the first quarter.Some commentators have gone further,…

The Trump administration said on Wednesday that it would overhaul a $42 billion federal grant program aimed at expanding high-speed internet to the nation, including easing some rules that could benefit Elon Musk’s satellite internet service, Starlink.The program will be revamped to “take a tech-neutral approach” in its distribution of funds to states, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said in a statement. The program’s rules, which were created during the Biden administration, previously favored broadband lines made of fiber-optic cables attached to homes.“The department is ripping out the Biden administration’s pointless requirements,” Mr. Lutnick said. The Commerce Department will also remove…

At a confirmation hearing for Dr. Marty Makary on Thursday, senators focused heavily on the safety of the abortion pill, with Republican lawmakers urging him to restrict access and Democratic lawmakers demanding that he maintain its current availability.Dr. Makary, President Trump’s nominee to lead the Food and Drug Administration, signaled that he shared Republicans’ concerns about the current policy, issued during the Biden administration, which expanded access by allowing people to obtain the pills without an in-person medical appointment.Several Democrats pointed to volumes of studies showing that the drugs are safe. Dr. Makary told members of the Senate health committee,…

Athena didn’t crash. But what did happen to it?Hours after the 15-foot-tall robotic spacecraft arrived at the moon’s surface, closer to the lunar south pole than any spacecraft has been, it remained unclear whether its touchdown was smooth enough to perform its intended work, or if it toppled over in the process, potentially limiting the mission’s scientific achievements.“We’re trying to evaluate exactly what happened in that last bit,” Tim Crain, the chief technology officer of Intuitive Machines, said at a news conference.The spacecraft is almost identical to Odysseus, the lander that the company sent to the moon last year. Odysseus…

When the White House finally released the text of Mr. Trump’s orders on Thursday evening, it appeared that some of the tariffs — those covered in the U.S.-Mexico-Canada trade agreement that Mr. Trump negotiated and celebrated in his first term — were indeed permanently suspended. Other tariffs were merely paused.Most everyone involved was confused, which may well have been the point.As Mr. Trump hands down tariff determinations and then pulls them back for a month or so, world leaders call to plead their case, a bit like vassal states appealing to a larger power. Chief executives put in calls as…

Starship — the spacecraft that Elon Musk says will one day take people to Mars — failed again during its eighth test flight on Thursday.It was the second consecutive test flight of the most powerful rocket ever built where the upper-stage spacecraft malfunctioned. It started spinning out of control after several engines went out and then lost contact with mission control.Photographs and videos posted on the social media site X by users saying they were along the Florida coast showed signs of the spacecraft breaking up in the sky. The falling debris disrupted flights at airports in Miami, Orlando, Palm…