Dockworkers at America’s East Coast and Gulf Coast seaports are threatening to go on strike and it could impact the all-important holiday shopping season.
Full Video Transcript Below:
CONWAY GITTENS: I’m Conway Gittens reporting from the New York Stock Exchange. Here’s what we’re watching on TheStreet today.
Wall Street is coming off yet another solid session with both the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq notching new record highs. This comes as investors anxiously await the Federal Reserve’s decision on interest rates, due out Wednesday. Markets are pricing in a 99 percent chance that the Central Bank holds rates steady. Investors also await the latest consumer inflation figures due Wednesday,
In other news – a potential dockworkers strike could cause another issue for the American economy. The International Longshoremen’s Association represents 45,000 dockworkers from Texas to Maine – and it has walked away from the bargaining table over the use of automated machinery. According to the union, a terminal operator was using automation to process trucks at its ports.
The current labor deal expires on September 30, and the leader of the ILA says workers will begin to strike on October 1 if a new deal isn’t reached. That would be terrible timing for the American economy just ahead of the busy holiday shopping season, and just a month before the presidential election.
But the owner of the ports in question, Danish-owned Maersk, pushed back on the union saying “We are disappointed that the ILA has chosen to make selected details of ongoing negotiations public in an effort to create additional leverage for their other demands.”
The National Retail Federation, which is a major lobbying group for retailers, is calling on the White House to step in and help negotiate.
That’ll do it for your daily briefing. From the New York Stock Exchange, I’m Conway Gittens with TheStreet.
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