Tariffs in the Dock, Jobs Cool and an AI Darling Trips: What’s Moving the U.S. Economy Today

At the opening bell on Wednesday, stocks were split: the Dow hovered near 47,080 (flat), the S&P 500 edged down to about 6,771 (-0.02%), the Nasdaq ticked up to roughly 23,360 (+0.05%), and the small-cap Russell 2000 added 0.3% to 242. In commodities, the U.S. benchmark crude contract traded around $60.6 (off roughly 0.6%), while the December contract for the yellow metal pushed toward $3,990 (up about 0.8%).

👉 Watch 25% Will Go Bankrupt

The Supreme Court will hear arguments this morning in a closely watched challenge to President Donald Trump’s sweeping use of tariffs, a case with economic and constitutional stakes that reach from Main Street importers to the Oval Office. NPR reports that the dispute turns on how far Congress empowered the president to tax imports under emergency authorities—and whether the White House overshot by levying broad duties across allies and rivals alike.

According to NPR, the plaintiffs say the administration’s shifting levies, initially at least 10% on most imports, rising far higher on Chinese goods and increased on Canada and Mexico, have whipsawed small businesses and consumers. “Americans are paying the taxes,” said Victor Owen Schwartz, a New York wine importer. The White House counters that tariffs have filled federal coffers and bolstered domestic industry. “Tariffs are going to make us rich,” Mr. Trump has said, with collections hitting an estimated $195 billion this fiscal year, according to a budget watchdog cited by NPR.

Earnings: AMD’s Beat Meets a High Bar

Away from the marble steps, markets wrestled with a classic “good news, not good enough” setup. Advanced Micro Devices delivered a beat-and-raise quarter anchored by data-center momentum and a steadier PC business, but investors, fresh off a strong run,wanted clearer evidence that today’s accelerator wins are scaling into higher-margin systems revenue. The company’s outlook explicitly excludes any revenue from MI308 shipments to China, reflecting export-control uncertainty. Bulls point to an MI350 ramp now and a 2H26 cadence for MI450 and rack-scale “Helios” systems; skeptics flag mix, margin and China risk as reasons for caution in a frothy tape.

Labor: ADP Shows a Tentative Rebound

Private employers added 42,000 jobs in October, the first increase since July, according to the ADP National Employment Report compiled with Stanford’s Digital Economy Lab. Hiring was uneven: education and health care and trade/transportation/utilities posted gains, while professional and business services, information, and leisure and hospitality shed jobs. Year-over-year pay growth was flat at 4.5% for job stayers and 6.7% for job changers, a sign wage disinflation remains gradual. Large employers added 73,000 positions, while small and midsize firms cut.

The Big Picture

Courtroom risks around tariffs, a high bar for AI leaders to prove durable systems economics, and a still-cool but stable private-job engine add up to a market narrative that is sensitive to policy and execution.