US open: Trump's G7 comments lead to losses at the bell
Wall Street trading opened with across-the-board losses on Friday as investors grew nervous ahead of the G7 summit in Canada, which looked set to be an acrimonious two days of talks.
As of 1535 BST, the Dow Jones Industrial was down 0.09% to 25,219.89, while the S&P 500 lost 0.14% to 2,766.45 and the Nasdaq dropped 0.36% to 7,607.49.
Connor Campbell, a financial analyst at SpreadEx, noted, "At one point facing a 100 point-plus fall after the bell, the Dow Jones ended up dipping a mere 30 points on Friday, a move that allowed it to keep above 25200. The avoidance of a severe drop in the US likely helped the European indices reduce their own losses."
At the G7 summit, French President Emmanuel Macron has warned that he won't sign the traditional joint statement unless progress is made on tariffs, while Germany's Angela Merkel will challenge Trump on trade, climate and security.
Trump tweeted on Thursday: "Prime Minister Trudeau is being so indignant, bringing up the relationship that the U.S. and Canada had over the many years and all sorts of other things [...] but he doesn’t bring up the fact that they charge us up to 300% on dairy - hurting our Farmers, killing our agriculture!"
Before that, he had tweeted: "Please tell Prime Minister Trudeau and President Macron that they are charging the US massive tariffs and create non-monetary barriers. The EU trade surplus with the US is $151bn, and Canada keeps our farmers and others out. Look forward to seeing them tomorrow."
The US President announced that he will leave the summit hours earlier than intended following the war of words between him and former allies and head directly to Singapore for a meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un.
Craig Erlam, senior market analyst at Oanda, said: "While Trump has at times appeared friendly with certain other heads of state in the past, the relationships have at least appeared to have become more hostile since tariffs were imposed on the European Union, Canada and Mexico by the US last week. The G7 meeting has become more like a G6+1, with Trump choosing to isolate the US on a number of issues from trade to Iran and climate change."
On the corporate front, shares of Broadcom were 2.93% weaker after its quarterly earnings late on Thursday, while US-listed shares of Deutsche Bank were down 0.97% following a report that it was exploring a possible merger with Commerzbank.
GE shares ticked up 0.83% after the industrial powerhouse said its quarterly dividend would remain at $0.12 a share, and shares in French therapeutics firm EDAP skyrocketed 67.87% to be the Nasdaq's biggest gainer after the ultrasound company received clearance from the US Food and Drug Administration to market its Focal One device.
On the macroeconomic calendar, US wholesale inventories came in a touch higher than initially estimated in April, the Commerce Department said on Friday.
Wholesale inventories edged up 0.1%, ahead of forecasts for the reading to be unchanged, following a 0.2% rise in March.