‘Bad News Is Bad News’: Jobs Data Shatters Wall Street’s Calm

For months, Wall Street brushed off Donald Trump’s trade war and the Federal Reserve’s higher-for-longer stance — confident a resilient economy would keep propping up US markets.

This week, that confidence began to unravel. Weak job growth and Trump’s latest volley of tariffs rattled investors, intensifying pressure on Fed Chair Jerome Powell to lower interest rates and exposing a new unease with the White House’s protectionist push.

A three-month stretch of nearly unbroken market calm was shattered on Friday after a US report showed a sharp slowdown in the labor market. Traders rushed into the safety of government ...