By Liz Moyer
Investing.com -- U.S. stocks opened lower as investors worried about rising tensions between the U.S. and China.
At 9:41 AM ET, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 255 points, or 0.8%, while the S&P 500 was down 0.5% and the NASDAQ Composite fell 0.2%.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s trip to Taiwan is helping to raise tensions. Shares of chipmakers, which have exposure to the China market, dipped in premarket trading in the U.S. as Pelosi and her delegation prepared to pay a visit to Taiwan as part of a multinational trip. She is the first Speaker to visit the island since Newt Gingrich in the late 1990s.
Meanwhile, corporate earnings continued to pour in. Late Monday, Pinterest Inc (NYSE:PINS) got a huge boost when activist Elliott Management confirmed it was the social media company’s biggest shareholder. Pinterest stock jumped more than 20% after-hours on Monday and was up 16% on Tuesday.
Ride-hailing firm Uber Technologies Inc (NYSE:UBER) shares rose nearly 13% after it reported $8 billion in revenue and said bookings were up 33% in the recent quarter. It had positive cash flow and attributed its loss for the quarter to investments in other companies.
Caterpillar Inc (NYSE:CAT) shares fell 4.6% after the construction equipment maker reported trouble with supply chains and said the suspension of operations in Russia helped it miss expectations.
The government’s data on job openings is due out later this morning ahead of Friday’s July jobs report. Analysts expect there to be 11 million openings.
Oil rose. Crude Oil WTI Futures was up nearly 1%, to $94.67 a barrel, while Brent Oil Futures rose 0.7%, to $100.77 a barrel. Gold Futures was up 0.5%, to $1,797 an ounce.