Sky News are reporting that hundreds of agency staff at Marks & Spencer’s main clothing and home warehouse in the East Midlands have been told not to come in,That highlights the disruption being cause by the huge M&S cyber-attack, which has led to the suspension of online orders last week,Exclusive: Marks & Spencer has told hundreds of agency workers at its huge Castle Donington distribution centre in the East Midlands not to come into work as Britain's best-known retailer grapples with the unfolding impact of a major cyberattack,https://t,co/hBK3eUvbiUTime to wrap up:Donald Trump’s increasingly erratic trade war has triggered a slump in shipments to the US’s most important ports, amid the growing risk of a recession in the world’s largest economy.

In the latest sign of the US president’s tariff policies rattling the economy, figures show the number of vessels scheduled to arrive at the Port of Los Angeles next week is down by almost a third on the same period a year earlier.According to the data compiled from ocean carrier manifest records by Port Optimizer, the number of arrivals this week is on track to be down by about 11% on the same week last year.Separate figures reported by the Financial Times from Vizion, a data provider, show container bookings from China to the US fell 45% by mid-April compared with a year earlier.Asset manager Apollo Global warned that the US trade with China was weakening, as America suffers a ‘stagflation shock’.Marks & Spencer has told hundreds of workers at its main online distribution centre in Leicestershire to stay at home as website orders remain on hold for the fourth day in a row.

The retailer, which is battling the consequences of a cyber-attack that began a week ago and has affected stores as well as its online business, told 200 agency staff at the Castle Donington site they were not currently required.The move, first reported by Sky News, came after it halted all orders through its website and apps on Friday.The company has apologised to shoppers for “this inconvenience”, which will hit its online clothing and homeware sales, which amount to almost £3.8m a day on average.Shares in M&S fell over 2% at one stage, and have closed down 0.

6%.The UK economy is set to slow sharply for the next two years as Donald Trump’s global tariff war weighs on consumer spending and business investment, a study by a leading forecaster has predicted.Manufacturing businesses in Texas have reported a slump in activity this month, as Trump’s tariffs caused economic disruption.Shares in Deliveroo have risen by 17% as investors reacted to a $3.6bn (£2.

7bn) takeover offer by the rival food delivery app DoorDash that could net its founder more than £170m,The EU’s strategy to secure its own supply of microchips is “deeply disconnected from reality”, a damning report by the official European court of auditors (ECA) has found,Britain’s blue-chip share index had matched its best run of daily gains in eight years – just!The FTSE 100 ebbed in late trading, perhaps hurt by that weak economic data from the US,But it ended the day in positive territory, up 2 points or 0,02% at 8417 points.

That means the FTSE 100 has risen for the last 11 days trading, matching the 11-day run recorded in December 2019.It hasn’t had a longer stretch since January 2017, when the index posted a 14-day rally.The FTSE 100 hasn’t recovered all its trade war losses, though – it had been trading over 8,600 points before Donald Trump announced his new tariffs on US trading partners at the start of April.Stocks have been rising as Trump backed away from a trade war, by pausing most of those tariffs for 90 days.Neil Wilson, UK investor strategist at Saxo Markets, points out that the FTSE 100 has “defensive characteristics” – many of its members are decent dividend payers.

But, he adds:Markets appear way too complacent at this stage – tariffs are on pause, not cancelled.Markets are behaving like the latter.Certainly the direction of travel can be ascertained ‘at the moment’, but we don’t what happens next.Because this is not a game of chicken that Trump is losing right now.The early Wall Street rally has rather fizzled out, after investors learned of the downturn in Texas’s manufacturing sector this month.

The Dow Jones industrial average is now flat, while the tech-focused Nasdaq has now dropped by 1%.Here’s some snap reation to the poor Dalles Fed manufacturing report:Dallas Fed manufacturing outlook dropped to its lowest level since May 2020.New Orders (green) declined while Prices Paid (blue) and Prices Received (red) rose.pic.twitter.

com/USkCd68PwmSince the market top in 2007 we really have not had a very good business environment long term.Here is the latest Dallas Fed Manufacturing Outlook Level of General Business Activity.It is the worst since COVID.#investing pic.twitter.

com/ZH0syUb9YcJust in: manufacturing activity in Texas has plunged at the fastest rate since the early months of the Covid-19 pandemic five years ago.Company bosses in the region are warning that Donald Trump’s trade war is hurting their businesses, withThat’s according to the latest Texas Manufacturing Outlook Survey from the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.It has found that business conditions worsened in April, with a measure of general business activity index falling to its lowest reading since May 2020.A gauge of economic uncertainty jumped, as bosses’ view of the economic outlook also fell to a postpandemic low.An index of new orders plummeted, while an index of shipments index fell into negative territory for the first time this year.

Pretty horrible Dallas Fed Manufacturing Survey,Level hits the lowest since May 2020,All the comments are about tariffs and policy uncertainty,Add it to the list of bad soft/survey data,pic.

twitter,com/PQByWPIFPiHelpfully, the Dallas Fed also released comments from survey respondents,One chemicals manufacturing firm said:“Tariff uncertainty and actual impact is likely to be significant for the business and ongoing projects”,A computer and electronics manufacturer also warned about the economic damage of a trade war, saying:There is really no way to predict anything accurately six months out or even six weeks out now for our industry due to the tariff and trade uncertainty,Carve-outs for large electronics businesses (cellphones and laptops) leaves small business burdened to deal with tariffs on our own, which are likely to cause delays, cancellations and early product obsolescence on existing products and orders.

We have already had to turn around and refuse shipments because customers cannot afford the tariffs, delaying our ability to build, which will eventually lead to job losses.If this continues for any length of time, many small companies are likely to be significantly hurt or even gone.If we want to bring manufacturing back to the U.S., can we try not to kill the companies that can actually help do that before we get the chance?Maybe we can think about using a scalpel rather than a sledgehammer? The risk we face now is far greater and less understood than what we saw during the COVID shutdown.

Consumers and businesses will limit investment and orders until there is some sense of stability, and we have already experienced this with smaller orders and delayed orders.It’s chaos right now.Food manufacturers also criticised trade uncertainty, with one saying:Tariffs and tariff uncertainty are wreaking havoc on our supply lines and capital spending plans.Travel companies are among the top risers on the S&P 500 in early trading, with Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings up 3.5%, and Southwest Airlines gaining 2,8%.

The New York stock market has begun the week with some small gains.The Dow Jones industrial average has risen by 184 points, or 0.5%, to 40,297 points.The broader S&P 500 has gained a more modest 0.1%.

Despite its recent recovery, the Dow is still down 3% over the last month,But even so, only Richard M,Nixon’s second term has offered a worse return from US equities, 100 days in, than Donald Trump’s second stintThat’s according to AJ Bell investment director Russ Mould, who explains:As President Trump approaches 100 days in office, an 11% rally in America’s S&P 500 index from its closing low on 8 April may just stop his second term in office from offering investors the worst start of any post-war American leader, in terms of stock market returns,“The S&P 500 is down by 7,9% since Trump’s inauguration on 20 January and only Richard M.

Nixon’s second term offered a tougher start for investors, as the index fell by 9.9% in the first 100 days of his second term back in 1973.”“The rough start to Trump’s second presidency, so far as share prices and the dollar is concerned, represents a remarkable shift in sentiment, given the rapturous welcome given to Trump’s election victory last November, when the S&P 500 (and the greenback) soared, while US Treasury yields remained stable.“The imposition of blanket tariffs, an escalation of tensions with China and then a flurry of sidesteps and backtracks, as additional reciprocal levies are delayed, exemptions are provided for technology hardware and tentative olive branches are offered to Beijing leave everyone confused and seem to be shaking markets’ prior strong faith in American exceptionalism.Despite all the anxiety about the economic damage of the US trade war, European markets are higher today.

In London, the FTSE 100 index is now up 30 points or 0.36% at 8445 points, on track for its highest close in over three weeks.Germany’s DAX is 0.7% higher, while France’s CAC 40 index is up 1%.In Madrid, the stock market is still operating despite the massive power outage hitting Spain, and Portugal, with the Spanish IBEX up 0.

6%.Tom Stevenson, investment director at Fidelity International, says markets are in limbo:“Investors are stuck in an uneasy place between optimism about the so-called Trump put and anxiety about what looks like an increasingly likely economic slowdown or recession.“The Trump put refers to the idea that there is a point at which the US President will respond to market weakness and reverse trade and tariff measures.Sharp rallies in both bond and equity markets in the past couple of weeks suggest that this put exists and that it will kick in at close to the recent market lows.“That’s the optimistic argument.

It is supported by still reasonable earnings growth expectations (albeit slowing in future quarters) and valuations which have fallen from their recent highs.“The earnings picture will become clearer this week as a swathe of results emerge across a range of key sectors.Most important of all will be tech stock results from Meta, Microsoft and Amazon.At the same time, valuations of those Magnificent Seven shares have come back from elevated levels to more reasonable multiples.The Mag Seven as a whole is now priced at 25 times expected profits, compared with 40 only a few months ago.

Germany’s Chancellor-in-waiting Friedrich Merz has declared today that he will urge Donald Trump to “go to zero” on all tariffs.Merz declared:“We will offer the United States of America that it would be best if we go to zero for all customs duties in the mutual exchange of goods.”He also suggested “the mutual recognition of technological standards” between Germany and the US, explaining:“What we have seen in recent years and decades are increasingly divergent technical barriers between the individual major trading nations of the world, which we must overcome, and this can also contribute to the sustainable reduction of bureaucracy.”Merz also announced some early cabinet picks – utility executive Katherina Reiche was named as his likely economy minister, and foreign policy expert Johann Wadephul, a former soldier and trained lawyer, gets the nod as foreign minister.M&S have confirmed that agency staff at its Castle Donington clothing and homewares logistics centre in the East Midlands were told not to come in today.

Workers employed by M&S at the site are still working, PA Media reports,The retailer’s stores are still open and operating, and shoppers are still able to browse its website and app,Contactless payments are also back online in stores after these were originally impacted by the cyber issue,The company has taken action to protect its network and has also reported the incident to data protection supervisory authorities and the National Cyber Security Centre,The chief executive of Channel 4, Alex Mahon, is to step down after eight years and will leave the broadcaster in the summer.

During her tenure Mahon, who joined in 2017 as the first female CEO in the broadcaster’s four-decade history, helped fight off two attempts to privatise Channel 4,The 51-year-old, who faced criticism when she took home the biggest pay packet of any chief executive in Channel 4 history, will be replaced on an interim basis by the chief operating officer, Jonathan Allan,“She has been one of the most impactful chief executives since Jeremy Isaacs’ founding of Channel 4 more than 42 years ago,” said Dawn Airey, interim chair at the broadcaster,Fast food chain Domino’s Pizza has reported a drop in US sales in the last quarter – a potentially worrying sign for the economy,Like-for-like store sales at Domino’s US outlets fell by 0.

5% in the first three months of this year, the company reports, taking the shine off a 3.7% rise in international same store sales growth.Investec analyst Kate Calvert has pointed out that the longer it takes for online sales to resume, the worse the hit would be for M&S.She says:“There will be a short-term profit impact without a doubt.”The gold price is slipping away from its recent record high today