US STOCKS-Wall Street gives up earlier gains as hopes wane for tariff delays, deals

Updates prices to afternoon trading

By Sinéad Carew and Shashwat Chauhan

April 8 (Reuters) - Wall Street's main indexes flitted between red and green on Tuesday afternoon after rallying sharply in the morning as investors' hopes ebbed for U.S. delays or concessions on tariffs ahead of a midnight deadline.

After stocks tumbled at their fastest pace since the pandemic in the last three days investors showed some signs of hope early in the day that President Donald Trump would soften his stance or postpone an April 9 deadline for tariffs.

But White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said on Tuesday afternoon that Trump expects tariffs will go into effect while nearly 70 countries have reached out looking to begin negotiations to reduce the impact of U.S. trade policies.

Market participants "were optimistic this morning that we would get some sort of sign that we're moving closer to a deal or a compromise with some of these bigger countries or that there would be a delay coming given that so many people wanted to negotiate," said Lindsey Bell, chief market strategist at Clearnomics in New York.

"That doesn't seem to necessarily be the case as we are quickly approaching the midnight deadline and investors are losing confidence."

The White House said on Tuesday afternoon that it expects more tariffs on China to go into effect on April 9.

This was after China had said earlier it will never accept the "blackmail nature" of the U.S. to Trump's threat to ratchet up tariffs on Chinese imports to more than 100%.

And United States ,Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said earlier that exemptions to the global tariffs are not expected in the near term.

At 02:33 p.m. the Dow Jones Industrial Average .DJI rose 164.35 points, or 0.43%, to 38,129.95, the S&P 500 .SPX gained 1.91 points, or 0.04%, to 5,064.16 and the Nasdaq Composite .IXIC lost 18.48 points, or 0.12%, to 15,586.47.

Materials .SPLRCM, down 1.8%, was the biggest loser among the S&P 500's 11 major industry sectors. The biggest gainer was financials .SPSY, up 0.8%.

After falling as low as 36.48 points earlier in the day, the CBOE Volatility Index .VIX - seen as Wall Street's 'fear gauge' - was last up almost 2 points at 48. It had risen on Monday to its highest level since August last year.

Worries that the aggressive U.S. tariffs could spur inflation and hamper global growth have led to greater pricing of interest-rate cuts by the Federal Reserve.

Traders see more than 90 basis points of easing by December, implying three fully priced in 25-bps cuts and a 60% chance of a fourth such reduction, according to LSEG data.

In individual stocks, Health insurer UnitedHealth Group UNH.N and Humana HUM.N jumped 5.7% and about 9%, respectively, after the U.S. announced a 5.06% increase in payment rates to private insurers for 2026 Medicare Advantage health plans.

Quarterly earnings season will kick off later this week, with JPMorgan, Morgan Stanley MS.N and Wells Fargo WFC.N set to report on Friday.

Declining issues outnumbered advancers by a 1.17-to-1 ratio on the NYSE where there were 4 new highs and 546 new lows.

On the Nasdaq, 1,794 stocks rose and 2,590 fell as declining issues outnumbered advancers by a 1.44-to-1 ratio.

The S&P 500 posted no new 52-week highs and 45 new lows while the Nasdaq Composite recorded 17 new highs and 309 new lows.

(Reporting by Sinéad Carew in New York, Shashwat Chauhan and Purvi Agarwal in Bengaluru; Editing by Arun Koyyur and Aurora Ellis)

((sinead.carew@thomsonreuters.com; +13322191897; Shashwat.Chauhan@thomsonreuters.com;))