The U.S. pushing back many of the tariffs announced earlier this year will help Wall Street through the end of the year, according to Wells Fargo. The bank's Investment Institute raised its year-end S & P 500 target range to 6,300-6,500 — putting the midpoint at 6,400. Strategist Darrell Cronk previously expected the benchmark to end 2025 between 5,900 and 6,100. "We believe delayed tariff increases will mitigate this year's U.S. economic growth slowdown and extend the soft patch into early 2026. This should dilute positive impacts from frontloaded tax cuts and deregulation during the first part of next year. We think the protracted tariff implementation will mute and defer the brunt of tariff-related price pressures until later this year and into early 2026," Wells said in a note to clients Friday. President Donald Trump in April unveiled steep charges on imported goods but soon pushed back the implementation of those duties. That helped the S & P 500 recover from a sharp sell-off that nearly tipped the benchmark into a bear market. The index last week hit a fresh record high of 6,481.34. .SPX YTD mountain SPX year to date "Extending tariff implementation over a longer period coupled with the passage of the tax provisions in the [One Big Beautiful Bill] has improved investor sentiment and our forecast for equity earnings and returns," Wells Fargo said. Not everyone is as sanguine on stocks right now. Evercore ISI's Julian Emanuel who, at 5,600, has the lowest S & P target in CNBC's Market Strategist Survey , said he thinks the benchmark could pull back by anywhere from 7% to 15% from current levels. He said Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell's upcoming speech Friday at the Jackson Hole symposium could send the market lower if investors leave with less confidence toward central bank rate cuts. "Powell on 8/22 is likely to indirectly signal a 25bp rate cut on 9/17/25 – stressing 50bp is not an option absent Labor market deterioration, and Oct and/or Dec cuts will be 'data dependent.' For a market that was eager to embrace '50 in Sept,' a balanced view could catalyze a near term -7% to -15% pullback into October, within the context of the Structural AI Driven Bull Market," Emanuel said in his weekly note to clients. UBS' wealth management arm also sees potential for "near-term volatility" with the market at current price levels. "Equity valuations are now elevated after a substantial rally in recent months," head of U.S. equities David Lefkowitz wrote. "The economic impact of U.S. tariffs is currently feeding through, with the labor market weakening and inflation rising. Uncertainty remains—regarding the scale, distribution and second-order effects." Still, Lefkowitz expects stocks to be higher a year from now.
