Weekly Stock Market Update | Dow, S&P 500, NASDAQ News – August 03, 2025 at 07:01 AM

The Dow Jones Industrial Average ended this week with a tumble, dropping by 542.40 points to close at 43,588.58, marking its worst decline since June 13. This followed the weak jobs report and modifications in tariff rates by President Donald Trump. The S&P 500 index also slid 1.60% to end at 6,238.01 in its worst day since May 21. Meanwhile, the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite experienced a dip of 2.24%, settling at 20,650.13, in its biggest drop since April 21.

For the week, the Dow fell 2.9% marking its worst performance since April 4, while the S&P 500 dropped 2.4% for its worst weekly performance since May 23, and the Nasdaq lost 2.2%.

The sell-off was particularly felt in the banking sector, fueled by investor fears that a slowing economy could impact loan growth. Big losers included JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, and Wells Fargo, with their shares pulling back over 2% and 3% respectively. Shares of GE Aerospace and Caterpillar also faced losses, dipping nearly 1% and 2%, respectively.

Tech giants Amazon and Apple also played a part in the selling pressure. Amazon’s shares tumbled over 8% after the e-commerce giant provided a weak operating income guidance for the current quarter. Apple’s stocks slipped by 2.5%.

On the other hand, healthy earnings reports emanated from Boeing, which posted better-than-expected results. However, weak reports from Spotify, Merck, and UnitedHealth weighed on overall market sentiment.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJI), S&P 500 (GSPC), and Nasdaq (IXIC) slid this week but retained overall monthly gains due to strong earnings from tech firms such as Meta Platforms (META) and Microsoft (MSFT), demonstrating faith in AI investments. The S&P 500 and Nasdaq even managed to close this month with respective gains of around 2.3% and 3.7%.

However, investor sentiment fell on impending Trump tariffs and a key jobs report. The tech market was boosted by Meta Platforms (META) and Microsoft, whose stocks gained 11% and 8%, respectively, after strong earnings reports. Microsoft’s market capitalisation crossed $4 trillion. On the downside, the labor market appears to have weakened over the past three months, causing a 3% drop in Dow and over 2% decline in Nasdaq and S&P 500.

The Federal Reserve’s preferred inflation gauge released this week evidenced price increases in June, remaining above the Fed’s 2% target. The Fed maintained interest rates in its two-day policy meeting midweek, which led to a drop in the probabilities of a September rate cut from 60% to below 40% according to CME Group.

Further, there were significant job revisions for May and June. The job gains for May were adjusted down to 19,000 from 144,000 and June’s numbers went down to 14,000 from 147,000 initially reported. This is regarded as largest revision since 1979 at least, excluding 2020 pandemic figures. This coupled with weakening labor market could push Federal Reserve to cut rates in September, a probability which rose sharply to 83% after the job data release.

Finally, Trump extended a 25% tariff on Mexican imports by another 90 days, which cast a shadow on market sentiment. All these factors combined to impact investor sentiment towards stocks while keeping an eager eye on further developments.