511–520 of 843 posts
It feels like a company should have to prove they didn't pass the tariff on to consumers in order to collect this.
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Cool! How much money did you yourself make on this (given that it was entirely obvious, and not leveraging knowledge seems silly)?
A lot. If you remember all the tariff announcements in the first months of 2025, the stock market tanked and it was an easy buy. The market then reasonably quickly realized many of these tariffs weren't going to persist. The payoff was fast, and the reason you didn't see a massive uptick in the market when the ruling came out was because it was already priced in at that point. Just because something isn't obvious to…
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Wrong. People who work in finance (I spent years there) are allowed to trade stocks their company is trading. There is a process to get approval. The equities division at an IB might be trading every single name in the S&P500. If you sit in the investment banking division and that division isn't doing anything related to a name, you are likely to get approval. In this case, the idea that Cantor can't do something bec…
> In this case, the idea that Cantor can't do something because the former head is now in a government job is crazy. No one "in the business" thinks Cantor is suddenly hobbled. That's not the idea, and it almost seems like a straw man to be honest. The actual idea is that the current head of Cantor can't do something because he's a direct relative of a high ranking government official whose powers and job duties pres…
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It's not insider trading, but surely it's a conflict of interesting? If you ignore all the specific name calling, isn't it still quite wrong that one minister can financially bet against the administration?
> isn't it still quite wrong that one minister can financially bet against the administration? Why?
Side topic, but this number puts into how crazy it was for trump[0] to go on tariff war against enemies and friends alike. All the propaganda and extortionist language about how all countries will pay up to USA. Astronomical tariffs in some cases, trade wars and dramas, alienate all allies and from all of this they got only $130B ? $7T of spending, $1.77T in deficit[1] and they planned to fix this hole with $100B?! M…
Astronomical tariffs in some cases, trade wars and dramas, alienate all allies and from all of this they got only $130B ? Maybe that was never the point. You present it as retaliation against 'countries that are out to get us'. Introduce the tariffs, companies pay the tariffs by increasing prices for consumers, get the inevitable loss in court, return the tariff money to the companies. You just transferred $130B of w…
Even if the tariffs are not a lot, they are potent negotiating leverage.
They def knew they were lying about much they were collecting
They def knew they were lying about who is paying
They lied to the public about that and got a bit of extra creme in the bag but the effect was mostly leverage, which 'kind of worked'.
They could have very effectively used illegal tariffs to actually do 90-deals-in-90 days, knowing the case would take time to draw out.
But - they have no plan.
Trump does not think 9 months ahead - he has grudges, grievances, and he pursues whatever grievance he wants to that day.
He doesn't forget and will push his staff to go against old enemies
The point is not to improve the economy, bring back jobs - the point is to 'Look Tough' and 'Stick it to the Libs and Foreigners' and to get elected again, failing that, rig the elections (note, his secret signed Executive order with all sorts of things regarding elections)
The 'high visibility' of ICE is not a bad thing for him - it very much in purpose to show MAGA base that he's cracking liberal, immigrant and brown people heads.
Jamming those Somalis on the concrete is exactly the optics he wants for his base.
It was only until people started dying when newsmax/fox started questioning the legitimacy and some support is lost - and not even that much among the base.
Same thing with tariffs: he will play grievance, the 'Liberal Courts' are against, him blah blah and MAGA will be fine with it.
The problem is that Core MAGA is maybe really only 20% and Soft MAGA another 15% and that's not enough to win.
But it's almost.
Narrative, performance, grievance, populism, social media, information sphere - that's it.
It's Post-Truth.
People keep talking about these through the lens of the 'issues', it's completely wrong headed - policies don't matter, only perception etc.
Reality does have a way of sneaking through though, and 'hardball reality' can change minds. People do understand Epstein, tariffs when they pay attention, unemployment, prices, 'war mostly bad' etc. etc..
This is White House Reality TV, not really policy and that's the best way to understand it.
The entire Cabinet have completely been unable to explain the tariff policy - they keep changing their views there is no consistency - it's the same with the war in Iran - everyone's saying different things, objectives are unclear.
It's irrational too think that there is 'policy' here, this is whim, impulse, populism.
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In the business, even the appearance of impropriety is damaging. People who work in finance aren't allowed to trade the same stocks as their company is trading, whether they have any inside info or not. The assumption is that simply by being close to a source of information, you are compromised. The same restrictions should apply to those close to government. By being family, he is compromised by default.
Almost all companies issuing stock to employees also ban them and their family members and fellow house residents from trading in the same stock to avoid insider style improprieties and the SEC has frequently prosecuted such cases. Wild that congress and WH staff have zero such restrictions even in 2026!
(and/or have an explicit approval workflow that effectively does the above).
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Such a regressive tax to get behind. Now if tariffs had only been applied to, I don't know, yachts, private jets…
Rich people consume a lot more, so a consumption tax would be ideal if you eased other tax categories like income tax and/or capital gains. It's easy to administer and would boost investment across the economy IMO.
Working class often live paycheck to paycheck. Unless rich are also living paycheck to paycheck I'm not sure I the two really compare.
That's of course the idea behind a progressive tax: it scales to what an individual "can afford".
Cantor Fitzgerald, formerly led by Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick and is now run by his son, went to various companies that were affected by tariffs and bought the rights to their potential tariff refunds for 20% of the value on the expectation that it'd be struck down by the courts. Now they stand to make huge returns of 3 to 5x for being correct on that bet, while, of course, consumers get nothing. Now if this i…
Source? I saw this claim going around but the one actual source supporting the claim was more like “we have the cash to buy them if folks are willing to sell them” and didn’t go any further than that. Via Newsweek, Cantor Fitzgerald has affirmed it “never executed any transactions or taken risk on the legality of tariffs.” https://www.newsweek.com/howard-lutnick-sons-may-make-money-...
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Astronomical tariffs in some cases, trade wars and dramas, alienate all allies and from all of this they got only $130B ? Maybe that was never the point. You present it as retaliation against 'countries that are out to get us'. Introduce the tariffs, companies pay the tariffs by increasing prices for consumers, get the inevitable loss in court, return the tariff money to the companies. You just transferred $130B of w…
It was also used to frame why the new tax cuts were justified, even though the optimistic math never worked out either.