Market Report for Wednesday, June 4, 2025
Wall Street spent Wednesday wrapped in a shawl of soft data and political shouting, unsure whether to brace for frost or flirt with summer. The market didn’t rally, didn’t retreat—just stood there, sniffling. Providing the soundtrack: President Trump’s latest ballad, “Too Late Powell,” performed in all caps.
Level Change 6/4/25 (%)
– – – – – – – – – – – – – – –
-0.2 Dow
+0.3 Nasdaq
+0.3 Nasdaq 100
+0.0 S&P 500
-0.2 S&P 400
-0.3 S&P 600
May’s ADP report landed with the grace of a brick in a birdbath: just 37,000 private payrolls, a miss of 93,000 and the weakest showing since March 2023. Wages held their ground, but it’s hard to admire a flat paycheck when the job offers stop arriving. With Friday’s government report on deck, traders are bracing for a possible miss, and more tweets.
What once looked like a strategic pause for the labor market now looks more like an unplanned intermission. As Indeed economist Allison Shrivastava put it, “the market can’t keep steadily cooling off forever before it just turns cold.” Wednesday’s numbers suggests we might be approaching that temperature threshold.
Trump, never one to miss a Fed critique opportunity, immediately pounced on the ADP release with characteristic subtlety:
“ADP NUMBER OUT!!! ‘Too Late’ Powell must now LOWER THE RATE. He is unbelievable!!! Europe has lowered NINE TIMES!”
The exclamation points did their work—Treasuries rallied as markets contemplated whether Fed Chair Powell’s spine might finally soften under pressure and prose.
The ISM Services index joined ADP in the cooling chorus, slipping back into contraction for the first time in almost a year. New orders nose-dived nearly six points to their weakest since December 2022, while price pressures reached their highest since the following November, an elegant symmetry if you like your pain evenly spaced. The one bright spot: employment crept back into expansion, a single green pixel in an otherwise bleak screen.
Survey comments read like excerpts from Tariff Cujo, a horror anthology in which HVAC systems go feral and timelines vanish in the fog.
One construction firm summed up the mood: “Tariff variability has thrown residential construction supply chains into chaos. … Major HVAC manufacturers are passing on cost increases from steel and refrigerant hikes. Planning is difficult for community projects that could be scheduled for the next 22 to 30 months.” Logistics firms called the whole setup a “moving target.”
If this is a soft landing, the seat cushions are on fire.
Meanwhile, the Fed’s Beige Book declared economic activity had “slightly” declined, a word serving as a tranquilizer dart for the anxious. Hiring was stable, but businesses flagged rising concerns about—you guessed it—rising prices.
In Washington, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office scored the GOP’s reconciliation bill with all the warmth of a hospital invoice: $2.42T added to the deficit over the next decade. Critics called the bill a fiscal fantasy. Supporters called the CBO “lefty.” The bill’s promised savings are still waiting on a calculator that runs on faith.
Still, the S&P kept its chin up, managing a third straight gain and up nearly 20% since April’s Liberation Day low. Investors, it seems, are betting that bad data will beget good policy, or at least easier money. Come on, “too late” Powell. Learn to blink on cue.
Whether that’s wisdom or wishful thinking will become clearer Friday. Until then, markets remain in wait-and-wince mode.
— Jason Kelly
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