NEW YORK, March 3 (Xinhua) -- U.S. stocks suffered big losses for the week, as investors digested Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell's testimony as well as President Donald Trump's announcement to impose steep tariffs on steel and aluminum imports.
Powell said in his first monetary policy testimony before the House Financial Services Committee on Tuesday that despite the stock market's recent volatility, Fed governors still plan on hiking rates multiple times throughout 2018.
He told lawmakers "gradually reducing monetary policy accommodation will sustain a strong labor market while fostering a return of inflation to 2 percent."
The new chair signaled the central bank could hike rates more than three times this year should economic and inflation data continue to prove healthy.
According to the minutes for Fed's policy meeting on Jan. 30-31, Fed officials have become more confident about the growth and inflation outlook. The Fed is expected to raise interest rates for the first time this year at the next policy meeting in March.
The U.S. trade policy was also in spotlight, after Trump announced Thursday that the United States will implement tariffs on steel and aluminum imports.
The United States is set to impose 25 percent of tariff on steel imports and 10 percent on aluminum as early as next week, Trump said Thursday after a meeting with business executives at the White House.
U.S. stocks tumbled for a third straight session after the announcement, with all three major indices dropping more than 1 percent.
The sell-off reflected Wall Street's concerns over inflationary risks and economic slowdown, two ramifications analysts predicted tariffs and other protectionist measures could bring.
Business Roundtable, an association of chief executive officers of America's leading companies, said it strongly disagreed with the announcement because it will hurt the U.S. economy and American companies, workers and consumers by raising prices which would lead to foreign retaliation against U.S. exporters.
On the economic front, U.S. new home sales dropped 7.8 percent to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 593,000 units last month, the lowest level since August 2017.
U.S. new orders for manufactured durable goods in January decreased 9.2 billion U.S. dollars, or 3.7 percent, to 239.7 billion dollars, worse than market consensus of a 2-percent decline.
The international trade deficit in goods was 74.4 billion dollars in January, up 2.1 billion dollars from the December reading.
U.S. real gross domestic product (GDP) increased at an annual rate of 2.5 percent in the fourth quarter of 2017, in line with market consensus, according to the second estimate released by the Commerce Department on Wednesday.
The Pending Home Sales Index fell 4.7 percent to 104.6 in January from a downwardly revised 109.8 in December 2017, missing market expectations.
U.S. personal income increased 64.7 billion dollars, or 0.4 percent, in January, above market consensus of a 0.3-percent gain.
In January, disposable personal income increased 134.8 billion dollars, or 0.9 percent, while personal consumption expenditures increased 31.2 billion dollars, or 0.2 percent.
In the week ending Feb. 24, the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial jobless claims was 210,000, the lowest since Dec. 6, 1969 when it was 202,000.
The final reading of U.S. Consumer Sentiment Index came in at 99.7 in February, generally in line with market estimates.
For the week, all three major indices saw sharp decreases, with the Dow, the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq tumbling 3.0 percent, 2.0 percent and 1.1 percent, respectively.
