Traders work at the New York Stock Exchange on July 15, 2025.
NYSE
Despite the noise around tariffs and inflation fears, the U.S. economy seems to be holding its ground — for now. June retail sales came in stronger than expected, and weekly jobless claims dropped below forecasts.
Add to that a solid start to earnings season, and you’ve got a recipe for record highs: both the S&P 500 and Nasdaq notched fresh peaks.
So, is the economy truly resilient in the face of the Trump administration’s shifting trade winds? Or are we simply in the eye of the storm, with August 1 — the Trump tariff deadline — looming on the horizon?
Remember, economic data is always a step behind. The real impact of tariffs may not show up for months, especially if businesses and consumers are stockpiling ahead of time and foreign exporters are cutting their prices.
Even when the new tariffs hit, the effects might be muted at first as inventories clear.
Still, for now, investors can take comfort in the fact that markets are being lifted by fundamentals — not just fear or speculation.
And yes, to borrow a line from Starship: the U.S. economy is still built on rock-solid data… not on rock and roll.
— Lim Hui Jie
What you need to know today
S&P and Nasdaq storm to new records. U.S. stocks climbed Thursday due to solid earnings and economic data, with the S&P 500 up 0.54% for a record close of 6,297.36 — its ninth this year. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite advanced 0.75% for its tenth record close of 2025, ending at 20,885.65. The pan-European Stoxx 600 gained 0.96% after a raft of earnings reports.
Trump takes aim at solar and wind projects. U.S. Interior Secretary Doug Burgum will now have the final say on whether those projects can proceed on U.S.-owned lands, as a way of “levelling the playing field” for coal and natural gas “after years of assault” by Biden administration, according to an Interior Department’s internal memo Thursday.
Layoffs at Amazon continue. The company confirmed layoffs in its cloud computing division Thursday. The company declined to say which units within Amazon Web Services were impacted, or how many employees will be let go as a result of the job cuts, but AWS’ training and certification unit was one of the groups to see cuts, according to a memo viewed by CNBC.
[PRO] The U.S. consumer pushes back on recession fears. U.S. consumers appear to prove economic pessimists wrong this summer as they flex their spending muscle, according to June’s retail sales report. But some alternative data suggests that the consumer is hanging in there.
And finally…
The growing prevalence of AI music has caused a stir across the music industry, according to Keith Mullin, head of management and music industry course leader at the Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts.
Da-kuk | E+ | Getty Images
AI-generated music is going viral. Should the music industry be worried?
With more than 1 million monthly listeners on Spotify, psychedelic rock band The Velvet Sundown is raking in thousands of dollars.
However, the “band” was recently confirmed to primarily be the work of generative artificial intelligence 一 something that had been heavily suspected and has the music industry asking itself questions.
— Dylan Butts