US: Wall Street slides a day after Federal Reserve rate cut

[NEW YORK] US stocks went nowhere on Thursday as investors lost their appetite in afternoon trade, a day after the US central bank delivered a widely expected shot of stimulus.

At the close, the benchmark Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 0.2 per cent at 27,094.79, erasing earlier gains in the day.

Meanwhile, the broader S&P 500 was flat, hovering near record levels at 3,006.79, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq was 0.1 per cent higher at 8,182.88.

Disney led the Dow lower, shedding 2.6 per cent.

The downcast day for stocks came as the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development slashed its global growth forecast for this year, citing persistent global trade conflicts.

Also on Thursday, a Hong Kong newspaper cited an informal adviser of President Donald Trump as saying Washington was ready to escalate the US-China trade war if no agreement was reached soon.

Michael Pillsbury told The South China Morning Post that Trump's critics would be wrong to assume the president is "just bluffing" in the trade confrontation with Beijing.

Another wave of US tariff increases is scheduled for October 1, with high-level US and Chinese officials also due to resume negotiations early next month.

The Fed on Wednesday lowered benchmark interest rates by a quarter of a percentage point and Fed Chairman Jerome Powell said policymakers would be ready to act aggressively if the world's largest economy began to deteriorate.

The outcome neither disappointed investors nor spurred buying.

AFP