Stocks closed broadly higher Monday amid hopes on Wall Street that the Trump administration may take a more targeted approach as it tees up a new round of tariffs on imported goods next week.
The S&P 500 jumped 1.8%. The index was coming off its first winning week after a four-week losing streak.
Click to Gallery
People work on the floor at the New York Stock Exchange in New York, Wednesday, March 19, 2025. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)
A stock market trader watches his monitors on the trading floor of the Frankfurt Stock Exchange, Germany, Thursday, March 20, 2025. (Arne Dedert/dpa/dpa via AP)
The display board with the Dax curve in the trading hall of the Frankfurt Stock Exchange, Germany, Thursday, March 20, 2025. (Arne Dedert/dpa/dpa via AP)
A currency trader reacts near a screen showing the Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI), top left, and the foreign exchange rate between U.S. dollar and South Korean won, top center, at the foreign exchange dealing room of the KEB Hana Bank headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, Friday, March 21, 2025. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)
The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 1.4%, and the Nasdaq composite closed 2.3% higher.
“The market was primed to respond well if the administration pulled back on some of the tariff threats or even provided off ramps for the tensions, and that’s kind of what we’re seeing here,” said Ross Mayfield, investment strategist at Baird.
Despite the gains, the benchmark S&P 500 has lost 1.9% so far this year out of concerns that a trade war could hinder economic growth and increase inflationary pressures.
Wall Street remains focused on how tariffs could eventually impact inflation, consumer spending and economic growth. Stocks have been riding waves of hope and worry as tariffs are announced, then either implemented or pulled. A new round of tariffs scheduled to be implemented on April 2 could also be softened or postponed rather than take effect.
Trump has been somewhat closely guarded about his plans for tariffs, saying Monday that even though he wants to charge “reciprocal” rates — import taxes to match the rates charged by other countries -- that “we might be even nicer than that.”
“The exact breadth and scale of the tariffs remain to be seen, and a cycle of tit-for-tat escalation is also possible in the weeks following the announcement, potentially triggering further bouts of market volatility,” said Ulrike Hoffmann-Burchardi, chief investment officer of global equities at UBS Global Wealth Management.
Gains on Monday were broad, with 84% of stocks within the S&P 500 ending higher. Nearly every sector within the index rose.
Technology stocks helped lead the way. The sector has been the driving force behind much of the broader markets movement, whether up or down. The stocks are among the most valuable on Wall Street and tend to have an outsized impact on the broader market's direction.
Nvidia rose 3.2% and Apple added 1.1%.
Tesla climbed 11.9% for the biggest gain among S&P 500 stocks. The electric vehicle maker is still down about 31% for the year. It has been struggling on worries that customers are turned off by CEO Elon Musk’s leading efforts to slash spending by the U.S. government.
Genetics testing company 23andme lost more than half its value after it announced over the weekend that it had initiated voluntary bankruptcy proceedings.
AZEK Co. jumped 17.3% after the building materials company announced it was being bought by Australia's James Hardie Industries in a cash-and-stock deal valued around $8.75 billion.
It's the second large deal in the sector in less than a week, with QXO Inc. announcing on Thursday that it was buying Beacon Roofing Supply Inc. in a deal worth about $11 billion, including debt.
All told, the S&P 500 rose 100.01 points to 5,767.57. The Dow gained 597.97 points to 42,583,32. The Nasdaq rose 404.54 points to 18,188.59.
In the bond market, Treasury yields rose. The yield on the 10-year Treasury rose to 4.34% from 4.25% late Friday.
Markets in Europe mostly closed lower, while indexes in Asia were mixed.
Chinese Premier Li Qiang struck a conciliatory tone during a meeting with business leaders and U.S. Senator Steve Daines, a strong supporter of President Donald Trump, who is the first member of Congress to visit Beijing since Trump took office in January.
Wall Street has several economic updates this week. Business group The Conference Board releases its consumer confidence survey for March on Tuesday. Wall Street expects the survey to show a slight dip in consumer confidence.
On Friday, the U.S. government releases the personal consumption expenditures price index for February. It is a measure of inflation closely watched by the Federal Reserve.
Recent economic reports have shown that the underlying economy remains strong, but that consumers are becoming more worried and cautious. They have also shown that inflation remains stubborn.
Stubborn inflation has prompted more caution from the Fed, which started cutting its benchmark interest rate at the end of 2024. Those cuts came after the central bank raised interest rates in order to cool inflation from a two-decade high.
Several measures of inflation show that interest rates remain just above the Fed's goal of 2%. The U.S. trade war with its key trading partners has threatened to reignite inflation and the Fed is holding off on further cutting interest rates to see how inflation and the broader economy reacts.
Lower interest rates can ease borrowing costs and help give the economy a boost, but they can also push inflation higher.
Jiang Junzhe and Matt Ott contributed to this report.
People work on the floor at the New York Stock Exchange in New York, Wednesday, March 19, 2025. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)
A stock market trader watches his monitors on the trading floor of the Frankfurt Stock Exchange, Germany, Thursday, March 20, 2025. (Arne Dedert/dpa/dpa via AP)
The display board with the Dax curve in the trading hall of the Frankfurt Stock Exchange, Germany, Thursday, March 20, 2025. (Arne Dedert/dpa/dpa via AP)
A currency trader reacts near a screen showing the Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI), top left, and the foreign exchange rate between U.S. dollar and South Korean won, top center, at the foreign exchange dealing room of the KEB Hana Bank headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, Friday, March 21, 2025. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Federal officers dropped tear gas and sprayed eye irritant at activists Tuesday during another day of confrontations in Minneapolis, while students miles away walked out of a suburban school to protest the Trump administration's bold immigration sweeps.
Meanwhile, the fallout from the fatal shooting of a Minneapolis woman by an immigration agent reached the local U.S. Attorney's Office: At least five prosecutors have resigned amid controversy over how the U.S. Justice Department is handling the investigation, according to people familiar with the matter.
Separately, a Justice Department official said Wednesday there's no basis for a criminal civil rights investigation. An FBI probe of Renee Good's death is ongoing.
Strife between federal agents and the public continues to boil, six days since Good was shot in the head while driving off in her Honda Pilot. At one scene, gas clouds filled a Minneapolis street near where she died. A man scrubbed his eyes with snow and screamed for help after agents in a Jeep sprayed an orange irritant and drove off.
It’s common for people to boo, taunt and blow orange whistles when they spot heavily armed immigration agents passing through in unmarked vehicles or walking the streets, all part of a grassroots effort to warn the neighborhood and remind the government that they’re watching.
“Who doesn't have a whistle?” a man with a bag of them yelled.
Brita Anderson, who lives nearby and came to support neighborhood friends, said she was “incensed” to see agents in tactical gear and gas masks, and wondered about their purpose.
“It felt like the only reason they’d come here is to harass people,” Anderson said.
In Brooklyn Park, Minnesota, students protesting the immigration enforcement operation walked out of school, as students in other communities have done this week.
The departures in the U.S. Attorney's Office include First Assistant U.S. Attorney Joe Thompson, who had been leading the sprawling prosecution of public fraud schemes in the state, according to people who spoke to The Associated Press on the condition of anonymity to discuss personnel matters.
With the Department of Homeland Security pledging to send more than 2,000 immigration officers into Minnesota, the state, joined by Minneapolis and St. Paul, sued President Donald Trump’s administration Monday to halt or limit the surge.
The lawsuit says Homeland Security is violating the First Amendment and other constitutional protections by focusing on a progressive state that favors Democrats and welcomes immigrants.
“What we are seeing is thousands — plural — thousands of federal agents coming into our city. And, yeah, they’re having a tremendous impact on day-to-day life,” Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey said.
A judge set a status conference for Wednesday.
Homeland Security says it has made more than 2,000 arrests in the state since early December and is vowing to not back down. Spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin, responding to the lawsuit, accused Minnesota officials of ignoring public safety.
In a different lawsuit, a judge said she would rule by Thursday or Friday on a request to restrict the use of force, such as chemical irritants, on people who are observing and recording agents' activities. Government attorneys argued that officers must protect themselves.
The Trump administration has repeatedly defended the immigration agent who shot Good, a 37-year-old mother of three, saying he acted in self-defense. But that explanation has been widely panned by Frey, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz and others based on videos of the confrontation.
State and local authorities are urging the public to share video and any other evidence as they seek to separately investigate Good's death after federal authorities insisted they would approach it alone and not share information.
In Wisconsin, Lt. Gov. Sara Rodriguez is proposing that the state ban civil immigration enforcement around courthouses, hospitals, health clinics, schools, churches and other places. She is hoping to succeed Gov. Tony Evers, a fellow Democrat, who is not running for a third term.
“We can take a look at that, but I think banning things absolutely will ramp up the actions of our folks in Washington, D.C.,” Evers said, referring to the Trump administration. “They don’t tend to approach those things appropriately.”
Associated Press reporters Ed White in Detroit; Steve Karnowski in Minneapolis; and Scott Bauer in Madison, Wisconsin, contributed.
Monica Travis shares an embrace while visiting a makeshift memorial for Renee Good, who was fatally shot by an ICE officer last week, Monday, Jan. 12, 2026, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/John Locher)
A protester is detained by Federal agents near the scene where Renee Good was fatally shot by an ICE officer last week, Tuesday, Jan. 13, 2026, in Minneapolis.(AP Photo/Adam Gray)
A protester grabs a tear gas grenade deployed by federal immigration officers near the scene where Renee Good was fatally shot by an ICE officer last week, Tuesday, Jan. 13, 2026, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/John Locher)
A protester is sprayed with pepper spray by a Federal agent Tuesday, Jan. 13, 2026, in Minneapolis.(AP Photo/Adam Gray)
Tear gas is deployed amid protesters near the scene where Renee Good was fatally shot by an ICE officer last week, Tuesday, Jan. 13, 2026, in Minneapolis.(AP Photo/Adam Gray)
EDS NOTE: OBSCENITY - Tear gas is deployed amid protesters near the scene where Renee Good was fatally shot by an ICE officer last week, Tuesday, Jan. 13, 2026, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/John Locher)
A protester is detained by Federal agents near the scene where Renee Good was fatally shot by an ICE officer last week, Tuesday, Jan. 13, 2026, in Minneapolis.(AP Photo/Adam Gray)(AP Photo/Adam Gray)
A protester grabs a tear gas grenade deployed by federal immigration officers near the scene where Renee Good was fatally shot by an ICE officer last week, Tuesday, Jan. 13, 2026, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/John Locher)
Fireworks are set off by protesters outside the Bishop Henry Whipple Federal Building, Monday, Jan. 12, 2026, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/Jen Golbeck)
Federal immigration officers detain a demonstrator outside Bishop Whipple Federal Building after tear gas was deployed Monday, Jan. 12, 2026, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/Jen Golbeck)
Federal immigration officers are seen outside Bishop Whipple Federal Building after tear gas was deployed Monday, Jan. 12, 2026, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/Jen Golbeck)
Federal agents drive through smoke from tear gas dispersed during a protest, Monday, Jan. 12, 2026 in Minneapolis (AP Photo/Adam Gray)
A protester's face is doused in water after he was pepper sprayed outside of the Bishop Whipple Federal Building, Monday, Jan. 12, 2026, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/Jen Golbeck)
EDS NOTE: OBSCENITY - A man gestures as he walks toward a cloud of tear gas that was deployed by federal immigration officers Monday, Jan. 12, 2026, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/John Locher)
Protesters try to avoid tear gas dispersed by federal agents, Monday, Jan. 12, 2026 in Minneapolis (AP Photo/Adam Gray)
Federal agents get ready to disperse tear gas into a crowd at a protest, Monday, Jan. 12, 2026 in Minneapolis (AP Photo/Adam Gray)