Nearly three-quarters of Japanese companies expect Donald Trump’s next term as US president to hurt their business environment, citing planned tariff hikes and US-China trade tensions as causes of concern, a Reuters survey showed.

Trump returns to the White House in January, having threatened tariffs over 60% on US imports of Chinese goods. A Reuters poll of economists predicts those initial tariffs could be imposed from early next year, with the median estimate at 38% and projections ranging from 15% to 60%.

Trump has also threatened levies of 25% on goods from Canada as well as Mexico, where several Japanese automakers have factories.

“It’s hard to predict his policies, and that makes it difficult for our client companies to make investment decisions,” a manager at a machinery maker wrote in the survey.

While 73% of respondents said Trump’s second tenure at the White House would not be good for their business environment, the rest expect positive impacts, citing an expected expansion of U.S. domestic demand through tax cuts as well as likely revisions to energy and environmental policies.

Asked what measures they would take if Trump hikes tariffs, two-thirds of the survey respondents said their business strategy was unlikely to change, while 22% said they would cut costs and 8% said they would work to expand their presence in markets other than the United States.

The survey was conducted by Nikkei Research for Reuters from Nov. 27 to Dec. 6. Nikkei Research reached out to 505 companies and 236 responded on condition of anonymity.

Though worries about the implications of a second Trump presidency abound, half of the respondents said they expect their earnings to increase in the next financial year. About a fifth anticipate a year-on-year decline while the rest predict earnings will be roughly the same.

Some 1,000 Japanese listed companies saw combined net profit climb 15% in the six months to September, according to an analysis by the Nikkei Business Daily.

Banks benefited from rate hikes – albeit to still very low levels, while shippers got a boost from higher freight rates and hotel and railroad operators saw a boom in inbound tourism, it said.

About 60% of respondents to the Reuters survey expect the dollar to trade between 140 yen and 150 yen in 2025.

The yen has been under pressure for years due to the large gap between high U.S. interest rates and rock-bottom Japanese rates, with the currency touching an almost four-decade low of 161.96 to the dollar in July. It has since rebounded thanks to both official intervention and Japan tightening monetary policy at the same time as the U.S. loosens and was trading around 151 yen on Wednesday.

Asked about Bank of Japan Governor Kazuo Ueda’s stewardship, slightly more than half of respondents said they held positive views on his ability to normalise the BOJ’s monetary policy after ending negative interest rates in March, the survey showed.

That compares with the 24% who do not hold favourable views of Ueda’s capabilities to do so.

The BOJ raised its short-term policy target to 0.25% in July and just over a half of economists polled by Reuters last month expect the BOJ to raise rates again next week.

U.S. stock indexes got back to climbing on Wednesday after the latest update on inflation appeared to clear the way for more help for the economy from the Federal Reserve.

The S&P 500 rose 0.8% to break its first two-day losing streak in nearly a month and finished just short of its all-time high. Big Tech stocks led the way, which drove the Nasdaq composite up 1.8% to top the 20,000 level for the first time. The Dow Jones Industrial Average, meanwhile, lagged the market with a dip of 99 points, or 0.2%.

Stocks got a boost as expectations built that Wednesday’s inflation data will allow the Fed to deliver another cut to interest rates at its meeting next week.

Traders are betting on a nearly 99% probability of that, according to data from CME Group, up from 89% a day before. If they’re correct, it would be a third straight cut by the Fed after it began lowering rates in September from a two-decade high. It’s hoping to support a slowing job market after getting inflation nearly all the way down to its 2% target.

Lower rates would give a boost to the economy and to prices for investments, but they could also provide more fuel for inflation.

“The data have given the Fed the ‘all clear’ for next week, and today’s inflation data keep a January cut in active discussion,” according to Ellen Zentner, chief economic strategist for Morgan Stanley Wealth Management.

Expectations for a series of cuts to rates by the Fed have been one of the main reasons the S&P 500 has set an all-time high 57 times this year, with the latest coming last week.

The biggest boosts for the index on Wednesday came from Nvidia and other Big Tech stocks. Their massive growth has made them Wall Street’s biggest stars for years, though other kinds of stocks have recently been catching up somewhat amid hopes for the broader U.S. economy.

Tesla jumped 5.9% to finish above $420 at $424.77. It’s a level that Elon Musk made famous in a 2018 tweet when he said he had secured funding to take Tesla private at $420 per share.

Stitch Fix soared 44.3% after the company that sends clothes to your door reported a smaller loss for the latest quarter than analysts expected. It also gave financial forecasts for the current quarter that were better than expected, including for revenue.

GE Vernova rallied 5% for one of the biggest gains in the S&P 500. The energy company that spun out of General Electric said it would pay a 25 cent dividend every three months, and it approved a plan to send up to another $6 billion to its shareholders by buying back its own stock.

On the losing end of Wall Street, Dave & Buster’s Entertainment tumbled 20.1% after reporting a worse loss for the latest quarter than expected. It also said CEO Chris Morris has resigned, and the board has been working with an executive-search firm for the last few months to find its next permanent leader.

Albertsons fell 1.5% after filing a lawsuit against Kroger, saying it didn’t do enough for their proposed $24.6 billion merger agreement to win regulatory clearance. Albertsons said it’s seeking billions of dollars in damages from Kroger, whose stock rose 1%.

A day earlier, judges in separate cases in Oregon and Washington nixed the supermarket giants’ merger. The grocers contended a combination could have helped them compete with big retailers like Walmart, Costco and Amazon, but critics said it would hurt competition.

After terminating the merger agreement with Kroger, Albertsons said it plans to boost its dividend 25% and increased the size of its program to buy back its own stock.

Macy’s slipped 0.8% after cutting some of its financial forecasts for the full year of 2024, including for how much profit it expects to make off each $1 of revenue.

All told, the S&P 500 rose 49.28 points to 6,084.19. The Dow dipped 99.27 to 44,148.56, and the Nasdaq composite rallied 347.65 to 20,034.89.

In the bond market, the yield on the 10-year Treasury rose to 4.27% from 4.23% late Tuesday. The two-year Treasury yield, which more closely tracks expectations for the Fed, edged up to 4.15% from 4.14%.

In stock markets abroad, indexes rose across much of Europe and Asia.

Hong Kong’s Hang Seng was an outlier and slipped 0.8% as Chinese leaders convened an annual planning meeting in Beijing that is expected to set economic policies and growth targets for the coming year.

South Korea’s Kospi rose 1%, up for a second straight day as it climbs back following last week’s political turmoil where its president briefly declared martial law.

A Chinese business delegation expressed interest to invest one billion dollar to establish a medical city in Pakistan to advance the country’s healthcare sector.

The Chinese delegation, led by the Chinese Consul General in Karachi Yang Yundong, held a meeting with President Asif Ali Zardari in Karachi.

The delegation also expressed interest to invest in diverse sectors of Pakistan’s economy, especially agriculture, livestock, energy, transport, and manufacturing.

During the meeting, the president called for greater Chinese investment in diverse sectors of Pakistan’s economy. He said it will help further boost economic and commercial cooperation between the two brotherly countries.

He emphasised the need for enhanced interaction between the people of the two countries, especially between the investors and businesses, to increase bilateral trade and economic relations.

Welcoming the delegation, President Zardari said Pakistan and China shared commonalities of interest and views on important issues, besides enjoying deep-rooted and historic brotherly ties.

He said Pakistan and China have been close friends for decades, and it was his vision to develop Gwadar Port into a regional trade and economic hub that would not only improve regional connectivity but would also boost regional trade and economic cooperation.

The president said that Pakistan would welcome Chinese investors and prefer to do business with China.

He said Pakistan is committed to facilitating and supporting Chinese investors in every possible way.

The President highlighted that Chinese language courses have been introduced in Sindh, which would prove to be an important step towards strengthening people-to-people and cultural linkages between Pakistan and China.

Chief Minister Sindh, Syed Murad Ali Shah and provincial ministers also attended the meeting.