NEW YORK, New York - U.S. industrial stocks were weaker on Tuesday. Tech shares made modest gains.

U.S. President Donald Trump who has routinely moved global markets up and down routinely for many months now with pronouncements on the prospects for a trade deal with China, was at it again on Tuesday. He threatened to re-impose tariffs if no deal is done that he didn't "like."

As we have said before, it is almost as though Mr Trump is actively engaged in insider trading, given that his announcements are unpredictable, and it would appear only he knows when he is going to make them. We stress there is no evidence the president is engaged in insider trading.

"If we don't make a deal with China, I'll just raise the tariffs even higher," Mr Trump unexpectedly told a room filled with senior U.S. officials on Tuesday.

The Dow Jones industrials gave up 104.46 points or 0.37% to close at 27,931.76.

The Standard and Poor's 500 lost 1.31 points or 0.04% to 3,120.72.

The Nasdaq Composite rose 21.62 Points or 0.25% to 8,571.61.

The U.S. dollar was mixed, losing ground against the euro, but recovering somewhat against the British pound.

The Japanese yen edged higher to 108.55. The Swiss franc eased to 0.9906. The euro rose to 1.1077.

Sterling, which had earlier hit a high of 1.2970, wilted late in the New York day Tuesday, to be approaching the close at 1.2925.

The Canadian dollar fell sharply to 1.3268. The Australian and New Zealand dollars made good gains to finish the New York day around 0.6826 and 0.6426 respectively.

On overseas equity markets the FTSE 100 in London rose 0.22%. The German Dax edged up 0.11%. The Paris-based CAC 40 went against the trend, losing 0.35%.

On Asian markets Tuesday, the Nikkei 225 fell 124.11 points or 0.53% to 23,292.65.

The Australian All Ords gained 42.20 points or 0.62% to 6,914.10.

China's Shanghai Composite added 24.79 points or 0.55% to 2,933.99.

The best performer surprisingly was the Hong Kong index, the Hang Seng which rose sharply by 412.71 points or 1.55% to 27,097.80.