The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped sharply on Friday after the Trump White House announced that the U.S. would levy heavy tariffs on its largest trading partners, which many economists and observers have long warned could create price shocks and have other widespread economic repercussions.
UPDATE: The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed 337 points down following the tariffs announcement. Yahoo! Finance added “All three major gauges fell into the red Friday. The S&P 500 (^GSPC) lost 0.5% at the closing bell, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI) shed 0.8%. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite (^IXIC) gave up 0.3%, reversing earlier gains.”
Fox News anchor Sandra Smith reported on White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt’s announcement and its immediate market reaction, saying, “John, perhaps some of the biggest news out of this: This press briefing just now was confirmation that the tariffs will go into place tomorrow for Mexico, Canada and China. Remember, this was put into place weeks ago, the February 1st deadline. She said ‘promises made, promises kept.’”
“That will be happening 25% for Mexico, 25% for Canada, 10% tariffs on China. There was a bit of a market reaction. You can see the Dow off more than 200 points. If you pop up the big board, John, you’ll see right about the time she confirmed that these will begin tomorrow, shortly after the 1:00 Eastern Time hour. That’s when you saw the Dow sell-off and not a huge sell-off, but there was certainly a reaction to that,” Smith continued.
Co-anchor John Roberts replied, “Well, they have still got ten hours to try to avoid tariffs before they snap into place at 12:01 a.m. So I wouldn’t be surprised if the president hears from Canada and hears from Mexico and maybe even gets a call from his friend Xi Jinping. Don’t know.”
Roberts then pivoted to discuss other topics at the Friday press briefing, “She also talked a lot about hiring and wanting to have the best and the brightest in the federal government, but not specifically talking about staffing at the air traffic control tower in Washington, D.C., just ahead of that that terrible crash last night.”
Watch the clip above via Fox News.