Wall Street was relatively quiet early Wednesday with major indexes ticking up modestly as the Trump administration seeks to win more favorable deals with global trading partners.
Futures for the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.3% before the bell, while the S&P and Nasdaq each nudged 0.2% higher.
Wednesday was initially set as a deadline by President Donald Trump for countries to make deals with the U.S. or face heavy increases in tariffs. But with just two trade deals announced since April — one with the United Kingdom and one with Vietnam — the window for negotiations has been extended to Aug. 1. The extension has calmed Wall Street for the time being, unlike the tariff rollouts of the spring, which sent markets swinging wildly from day-to-day for weeks.
Outside of trade talks, some corporate news surfaced after a typically quiet early summer stretch.
Pharmaceutical giant Merck is buying Verona Pharma, a U.K. company that focuses on respiratory diseases, in an approximately $10 billion deal. If approved by Verona shareholders and U.K. officials, Merck will get access to Verona's chronic obstructive pulmonary disease medication Ohtuvayre. Verona shares jumped more than 20% on the news, while Merck shares were effectively unchanged.
Delta Air Lines kicks off earnings season on Thursday, with most analysts expecting the airline's second-quarter profit to decline from a year ago. Delta and other major U.S. carriers have trimmed their flight schedules and pulled their forecasts this year as consumers pull back on travel and other nonessential spending due to uncertainty about how Trump's tariffs will affect their budgets.
Later Wednesday, the Federal Reserve will release the minutes from its June policy meeting, when it left its benchmark rate alone for the fourth straight time, also due to uncertainty over how tariffs will impact the labor market and broader economy.
In Asia, Japan's Nikkei 225 closed 0.3% higher to 39,821.28, while South Korea's Kospi added 0.6% to 3,133.74 as Tokyo and Seoul work on a trade deal with the U.S. before higher tariffs announced by Washington take effect on Aug. 1.
“Sectoral carve-outs remain the thorniest terrain," Stephen Innes of SPI Asset Management wrote in a commentary, adding that Korea and Japan are likely seeking relief for their car and steel exports. "But Washington is unlikely to bend,” he warned.
Meanwhile, Chinese markets were lower. Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index fell 1.1% to 23,892.32, while the Shanghai Composite index edged down 0.1% to 3,493.05.
Lynn Song, ING's chief economist for greater China, said in a commentary that deflationary pressures remain despite China's June consumer price index inflation returning to positive territory for the first time since January, beating market expectations. Inflation rose to 0.1% year on year from -0% year on year in May, according to data released on Wednesday.
Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 slipped 0.6% to 8,538.60. India's BSE Sensex edged 0.1% higher to 83,722.05.
Mizuho Bank said the tariff deadlines distract from "far more consequential, and expedient, sectoral tariffs, which arguably reverberate across global industrial ecosystems” and that the U.S. aims to isolate China from trade partners, supply chains and markets.
“The real danger is underestimating the fallout when (rather than if) China hits back" against the U.S. and countries it perceives as aligned with the U.S., the bank wrote.
Elsewhere, in Europe at midday, Germany’s DAX added 1.1% and France’s CAC 40 jumped 1.3%. Britain’s FTSE 100 inched up 0.2%.
In energy markets, benchmark U.S. crude gained 12 cents to $68.45 per barrel, while Brent crude, the international standard, added 11 cents to $70.26 per barrel.
The dollar was trading at 146.66 Japanese yen, up from 146.54 yen. The euro edged lower to $1.1707 from $1.1729.
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