In this episode, Scott Becker discusses strong market performance driven by big tech, upcoming tariff talks between the U.S. and China, and more.
Chapter 1: What are the current market trends?
This is Scott Becker with the Becker Private Equity and Business Podcast. These are three stories that we're following today. First, the markets are surging again as there's more good news and more also news that may lead the Fed to reduce rates. So as of this morning, the S&P is up 1.5%, the NASDAQ is up 2.6%.
Chapter 2: How are big tech companies performing?
Second, a big part of this is that the big tech companies are showing terrific resilience with respect to the talk of tariffs and trade wars and everything else. Microsoft's up almost 10% today. Meta Platforms is also up 6%. Microsoft reported terrific earnings, notwithstanding all the discussion about tariffs. The third story I'll talk about for a second. I know this is a complicated story.
Chapter 3: What challenges is the Trump presidency facing?
But one of the things that we see in the media is every media outlet or so many of them are doing everything they can to paint the first 100 days of the Trump presidency as an unmitigated disaster. And again, there are things I dislike about the Trump presidency. Number one is a constant war on DEI. There are things I don't dislike about the Trump presidency.
Chapter 4: What is the state of U.S. foreign relations?
You know, we've had this trade imbalance for 100 years. We've got horrible deficit spending. We've got some real challenges. The Ukraine-Russia war has been going on for years. The Middle East has been a debacle. As far as I could tell so far, the Middle East looks a little safer for the moment. Russia-Ukraine seems to be simmering down some for the moment. The
President Trump with respect to this trade war effort has certainly mitigated some of his efforts and tried to re-figure it out, which I give him great credit for trying to figure it out when obviously it stepped too quickly into this trade war fully. So when I look at the coverage of the first 200 days, I think there is a huge lack of balance on it.
And there's a lot of stuff that I dislike about President Trump. There's stuff I like about President Trump. But one thing I would say is he's certainly engaged in trying to solve some of these issues, solve some of these problems. And it is fascinating to watch. In any event, markets way up again today. We're in a situation today where Microsoft and Meta are really surging. They did well.
regardless of the tariff issues. There's also news that China and the U.S. are going to start tariff talks. And finally, you're in a situation where the overdoing of the Trump 100 days criticisms, you would think that we had started World War III. And as far as I could tell, we aren't there. So that's my thought on that. I know some people will not like that. I apologize.
I just think a more balanced approach on it is probably in order. Thank you for listening to the Becker Private Equity and Business Podcast. Thank you very, very much for listening.
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