Stock Futures Fall as Trump’s New Tariff Plans Worry Wall Street

U.S. stock futures declined Monday morning after President Trump announced new 15% tariffs following a Supreme Court ruling that blocked his previous trade levies. Investment experts say the ongoing uncertainty makes it difficult for businesses to plan their operations and supply chains.

Stock market futures dropped Monday morning as investors grew concerned about fresh trade uncertainty following President Trump’s announcement of new 15% tariffs after the Supreme Court blocked his earlier trade policies.

In a 6-3 decision Friday, the nation’s highest court invalidated most of the trade levies Trump had put in place last year, ruling that the emergency legislation he used as justification didn’t provide authority for such tariffs.

Working under different legal authority, Trump first declared a 10% worldwide levy, then increased it to 15%, with the policy potentially remaining in effect for five months as his administration looks for more permanent solutions.

Arthur Laffer Jr., who leads Laffer Tengler Investments, explained the challenge facing corporations: “It’s really hard from a business standpoint when you are at a company to know how do you plan if you’re not even sure about suppliers, supply chains and what the tariffs are going to look like.”

He added: “That’s a huge concern for corporate America and why it was really important to get that hammered out and ironed out as fast as possible, so that companies know what the playing field really looks like, and they can plan accordingly.”

Despite Monday’s decline, all major market indexes posted gains for the previous week as traders initially responded positively to the Supreme Court’s ruling, with the tech-heavy Nasdaq ending a five-week slide.

Early Monday trading showed Dow futures falling 125 points or 0.25%, while S&P 500 futures dropped 15.5 points or 0.22%. Nasdaq 100 futures decreased 91 points or 0.36% as of 5:22 a.m. Eastern Time.

Large technology companies mostly traded lower before markets opened, though Alphabet rose 0.5% after climbing about 4% Friday.

Chip giant Nvidia gained 0.2% ahead of its quarterly financial results scheduled for Wednesday. Investors will closely watch comments from the world’s most valuable company for clues about the artificial intelligence industry, which has faced increasing investor doubt.

Expensive stock prices and concerns about AI’s disruptive effects have recently hurt technology and other sectors, as market participants question whether enormous AI investments are generating returns.

Financial reports from major software companies like Salesforce and Intuit will draw attention this week, particularly since the S&P 500 software index has fallen over 20% this year due to mounting AI disruption worries.

In individual stock movements Monday, pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly jumped 4% after competitor Novo Nordisk’s weight-loss medication performed worse than Lilly’s treatment in a Copenhagen study.

Digital currency and blockchain stocks declined as bitcoin dropped approximately 2%, with exchange operator Coinbase Global and crypto investor Strategy each falling more than 1%.

Precious metals mining companies rose broadly as gold and silver prices increased. Leading gold producer Newmont advanced 1.1% while silver miner Hecla Mining gained 2.5%.