Yahoo Finance

U.S. stocks closed another volatile day lower, with the blue-chip Dow erasing a more than 1,400-point early gain to end down over 300 points, after the White House dashed hopes for a less aggressive tariff plan.

U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said President Donald Trump won't provide exemptions to his new global tariffs for individual products or companies. That was followed by White House confirmation that 104% tariffs on China will go into effect at midnight.

Planned higher reciprocal tariff rates for other specific countries on top of the 10% baseline duty implemented on Saturday also will kick in at midnight.

The Dow dropped 0.84%, or 320.01points, to 37,645.59; the broad S&P 500 slid 1.57%, or 79.47 points, to 4,982.78; and the tech-heavy Nasdaq slumped 2.15%, or 335.35 points, to 15,267.91. The benchmark 10-year Treasury yield rose to 4.281%.

Earlier, investors were heartened to hear that in addition to Vietnam offering to eliminate tariffs, Trump said he had a "great call" with South Korea and that China wants to make a deal although China hasn't reached out yet.

China has said it will "fight to the end." China's ministry said in a statement "the U.S. side's threat to escalate tariffs against China is a mistake on top of a mistake. China will never accept it."

European Union leaders have also said they wanted to negotiate but were readying retaliatory tariffs.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told CNBC on Tuesday that in all, around 70 countries had approached the U.S. for tariff negotiations and indicated the Trump administration is open to negotiation.

Sentiment soured though as the White House doubled down in the afternoon on aggressive tariffs.

Still, "we believe that many of the announced tariffs last week will be negotiated down," said Marc Zabicki, chief investment officer and director of research at LPL Financial. That means "the fundamentals of this market and economy, when the dust settles, may be better than what is currently being reflected in asset prices." He noted the most significant holdout has been China, but "that was to be expected."

Stocks swung wildly at the start of the week, opening lower, then briefly popping higher on a withdrawn report that President Donald Trump would delay tariffs for 90 days, before dropping again on a new Trump threat to levy an additional 50% tax on China if it didn't retreat from its 34% retaliatory tariff planned for Thursday. Volume was the highest in at least 18 years with roughly 29 billion shares changing hands.

Despite the sharp and swift drops over the previous three days, various firms like Wealthfront, Alight and Robinhood that track retail trading and 401(k) activity have noted that most investors remain invested with some picking up what they see as bargains amid the rubble and others moving to safer or value assets.