The US markets closed higher on Monday, thanks to signs that Trump may have softened his approach in a trade spat with China lifted appetite for global equities across the board. China’s foreign ministry spokesman, Geng Shuang, said trade tensions were the fault of the US and that his country couldn't engage in negotiations on the situation as it stands. Separately, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) urged policy makers to raise productivity towards supporting their goal of equitable growth, as the declining share of manufacturing jobs in overall employment has been a concern for policymakers and the broader public alike in both advanced economies and some developing economies. IMF in its release of the World Economic Outlook enlightened that the goal of supporting equitable growth would be better served by policy efforts to raise productivity across all sectors and make the gains from higher productivity more inclusive.
Meanwhile, the Congressional Budget Office forecast the return of trillion-dollar deficits in 2020, in the nonpartisan agency’s first budget update since the enactment of President Donald Trump’s tax cut law last year and the big spending bill this year. The CBO said the deficit for fiscal 2018 would total $804 billion, up from $665 billion in the last fiscal year. In 2019, the agency said, the shortfall will total $981 billion. Beginning in 2020, however, the CBO said deficits would exceed $1 trillion a year. The projected deficit for fiscal 2018 is $242 billion larger than the shortfall the agency projected back in June. The US last ran a budget deficit of more than $1 trillion in 2012.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average added 46.34 points or 0.19 percent to 23,979.10, the Nasdaq gained 35.233 points or 0.51 percent to 6,950.34, while the S&P 500 was up by 8.69 points or 0.33 percent to 2,613.16.
