Sky News halted for breaking announcement about Trump's tariffs

Sky News presenter Gareth Barlow halted proceedings on the channel to issue a breaking update as Wall Street opened for business. He revealed that US stocks had taken a further tumble following Donald Trump's trade tariff announcement on Wednesday (April 2), which he described as the United States' "declaration of economic independence".

"Stock have fallen sharply in early trading, down about 2.8%," he announced as he went to the channels Busines Correspondent Gurpreet Narwan who was in Westminster. "This follows China Beijing announcing the reciprocal tariffs on the United States. Big falls on the US markets, US banks, in particular, hard hit, I guess, in many respects to be expected," he put to her. "That's right. Another day of heavy losses expected on US markets. As you said, the Dow Jones Industrial Average has opened down 2.7% the NASDAQ technology heavy stocks on that index down 2.8% and the SNP 500 which gives us a sense of how corporate America is feeling," she confirmed.

"Even some positive jobs use jobs data that's just been published in the US, which shows that the US economy added 228,000 jobs in March, wasn't enough to stem the flow. [That's] a mere side dish to the main issue weighing on traders' minds, which is those tariffs. It's] something that's been affecting stock markets here in Europe all day as well. The FTSE was down as was France's CAG, 40, and in Germany the DAX also down 4.1%," she said.

This continued slump means Trump's controversial tariffs are now hitting American's pensions. Many Americans' pension pots, including 401(K)s, are invested in shares and funds meaning they are impacted by the stock market. A 401(k) plan is an employer-sponsored, defined-contribution, personal pension account in the US. Wall Street giant JP Morgan has said the risk of a global recession has shot up to 60% in the wake of the announcement of the wide-ranging reciprocal tariffs against some of the world's biggest economies.

The US President's long-awaited tariffs have sparked economic turmoil at home and abroad as market panic set in following the major change to US tax policy. The president’s announcement that all countries would now be subject to between 10% and 50% when selling goods to the world’s biggest economy saw an immediate backlash, with the US dollar slumping nearly 2%. Sir Keir Starmer has said he will be working tirelessly to ensure the UK can carve out an economic prosperity deal for the UK. But the worldwide chaos is set to hurt businesses in the UK and economists warn it could lead to more tax rises or spending cuts.