Investors mostly shrugged off Biden’s capital gains proposal in Friday trading, but indexes finished the week largely unchanged.
Major stock indexes showed solid gains on Friday, recovering from Thursday’s sell-off triggered by news of a proposed hike in the capital gains tax by President Biden, ahead of quarterly results next week from tech giants Apple, Facebook, Alphabet (Google) and Amazon. Stock markets sold off on Thursday, with the Dow falling more than 300 points, on a report that The Biden administration plans to hike the capital gains tax rate to 43.4% (including an Obama-era 3.8% tax on net investment income) from the current rate of 23.8% on certain gains for people earning more than $1 million annually. The proposal was widely criticized by Wall Street professionals. David Bahnsen, chief investment officer, The Bahnsen Group, a wealth management firm based in Newport Beach, Calif.
