Mumbai, March 26 -- The Nasdaq climbed 83.26 points (0.5%) to 18,271.86, the S&P 500 rose 9.08 points (0.2%) to 5,776.65 and the Dow inched up 4.18 points or less than a tenth of a percent to 42,587.50.

Trump said at an event on Monday that he may give a lot of countries breaks on reciprocal tariffs that are set to take effect April 2nd. However, he also said he plans to impose tariffs on the automotive and pharmaceutical industries in the very near future and later added the lumber and semiconductor industries to his list of targets. The president has recently made many conflicting remarks about his tariff plans, leading to considerable uncertainty on Wall Street.

The traders shrugged off a report from the Conference Board showing cons...