Stocks fall as inflation worries linger

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Stocks fall as inflation worries linger

Commerce to release economic updates Thursday and Friday and the US stock market is lower.

U.S. stocks fell early on Tuesday morning as concerns over inflation tempered optimism over President Joe Biden's remark early Monday that he was considering reducing U.S. tariffs on Chinese imports.

Biden, who was on a visit to Japan, said he planned to discuss the issue of punitive tariffs imposed on China during former President Donald Trump's administration and Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen when he returns to Washington.

I'm talking to the secretary when I get home. Biden said that they are considering it.

The comments raised hopes of an easing of tensions between the world's two biggest economies. Investors are looking for clues about the impact that surging inflation is having on profit margins and consumer spending habits, especially after very disappointing results last week from Walmart and Target.

A busy morning is ahead for retail earnings, with Best Buy, AutoZone, Ralph Lauren, Abercrombie Fitch and Petco posting ahead of the opening bell. The focus will be on Nordstrom and Urban Outfitters in the afternoon.

Investors are keeping an eye on the impact of the war in Ukraine on commodity prices and the possible blow to global economic growth due to the Pandemic lockdowns in China.

Wall Street had an upbeat start to the week after seven weeks of declines that have nearly ended the bull market that began in March 2020. The S&P 500 rose 1.9% to 3,973. Technology and financial sector stocks did most of the heavy lifting for the benchmark index, with 75 percent of the lifting coming from technology and financial sector stocks. The Dow Jones Industrial Average went up 2% to 31,880. 24 and the Nasdaq went up 1.6% to 11,535. Recent heavy selling has led traders to snap up large tech stocks and shares in other companies that had previously been high-flyers before the market slaps skids, said Quincy Krosby, chief equity strategist for LPL Financial.

Wall Street will get a lot of economic updates from the Commerce DepartmentCommerce Department this week. On Thursday it will release a report on first-quarter gross domestic product and on Friday it will release data on personal income and spending for April.

In Japan, Australia, South Korea and China, benchmarks fell, although some of the indexes had been higher earlier in the day.

Japan's benchmark for Nikkei 225 declined by 0.8% to 26,793 in the afternoon. Australia's S&P ASX 200 was slightly changed, falling by less than 0.1% to 7,144. The number of people that had fluctuated throughout the day was 30. South Korea's Kospi fell 1.1% to 2,617. Hong Kong's Hang Seng dropped by 1.7% to 20,125. 87 of the Shanghai Composite fell 1.2% to 3,109, while the Shanghai Composite declined by 1.2%.