WSJ What’s News
Countries Negotiating With Trump Over Tariffs Turn to Goldman Sachs
Mon, 28 Apr 2025
P.M. Edition for April 28. As countries scramble to appease President Trump over tariffs, they are turning to Goldman Sachs for guidance. WSJ reporter AnnaMaria Andriotis joins to discuss what advice the nations are getting. Plus, President Trump has taken aim at universities in recent months; now, a number of elite universities are banding together to resist his actions. We hear from WSJ higher education reporter Doug Belkin about how they are going about it. And President Trump is set to sign an executive order that would create a nationwide list of sanctuary cities and states in an effort to target Democratic jurisdictions that don’t cooperate with immigration enforcement. Alex Ossola hosts. Sign up for the WSJ's free What's News newsletter. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Chapter 1: How do countries negotiate tariffs with Trump?
Everything really comes down to Trump's feelings. So as you're looking for a pathway to better trade terms and lower tariffs, you might want to consider addressing these issues that both Trump and Musk have publicly basically blasted.
Chapter 2: What advice is Goldman Sachs providing?
Plus, Trump escalates his battle against Democratic-led states and cities that don't fully cooperate with immigration authorities. And elite universities are banding together to resist the Trump administration. It's Monday, April 28th. I'm Alex Osola for The Wall Street Journal. This is the PM edition of What's News, the top headlines and business stories that move the world today.
Chapter 3: Why are elite universities resisting the Trump administration?
Over the past few months, the Trump administration has taken aim at universities like Harvard and Columbia because it says the universities have not done enough to protect Jewish students from anti-Semitism. Now, we're exclusively reporting that universities are banding together to resist the Trump administration's actions.
A White House spokesperson said that the Trump administration is committed to reforming higher education and combating anti-Semitism. WSJ higher education reporter Doug Belkin is here now to discuss. Doug, how many universities are part of this collective?
There's about 10 universities that are part of the collective right now. They're mostly private, wealthy, blue state universities that have been approached by the Trump administration or are fearful that they are next. They see themselves as the locus of resistance, and they do believe that the number will grow.
Chapter 4: What challenges are universities facing from the Trump administration?
So why are these universities doing this? What is their goal here?
The Trump administration is asking a lot of several universities right now, and they're threatening to, and in some cases they have moved, to freeze or cancel research funding and grants. So universities are in a really tight spot. Things that the Trump administration is asking for start with asking the schools to prevent anti-Semitism, to make sure that harassment of Jewish students ends.
But it goes a little bit beyond that. The administration is asking for oversight of things like admissions and faculty hiring and to some extent curriculum and teaching and research. And that would end the independence of the universities. And that's where they are not willing to go right now.
Chapter 5: How are universities banding together against Trump?
Is it that the universities are trying to avoid the fate of some top law firms where one deal led to the others following suit?
Right. The law firms were picked off one by one, and the universities are trying to avoid that negotiating error by banding together and trying to draw a line that they can all hold to make it more difficult for the administration to essentially impact any one of them individually.
Can they succeed in resisting the Trump administration this way, or is there something that could undermine their efforts?
That's the $64,000 question right now. When Harvard was given a list of demands by the task force, they went public with that list. And in that list, they said that they would not meet a number of the demands. Harvard has said that they've sued on the grounds that their First Amendment rights and their due process rights have been abused.
Chapter 6: Can universities successfully resist the Trump administration?
And so they're hoping that the judge will stop the Trump administration. The issue that's at play here, though, is that the administration has a lot of different levers. They could potentially stop international students from enrolling. They're going after their tax-exempt status. It's not clear legally where they'll win and where the Trump administration will win.
And beyond that, there's future research funding that the Trump administration could make harder for for Harvard to get or the universities to get. And so it's not clear how this will play out.
That was WSJ reporter Doug Belkin. Thank you, Doug.
Thanks very much.
U.S. stocks wobbled throughout the day and major indexes ended the day mixed. The Dow rose about 0.3 percent, the S&P 500 was up about 0.1 percent, and the Nasdaq fell 0.1 percent. In times of economic turmoil, many investors turn to hard assets like gold and silver. This current moment is no exception.
Gold is up around 41% over the past 12 months, and last week it reached a record high in dollar terms before pulling back. And silver has risen around 23% over the past year, lower than gold but still beating the S&P 500's 6% return over that period.
Deputy editor of Heard on the Street, Aaron Back, told our Your Money Briefing podcast what makes commodities like gold and silver so appealing to investors trying to hedge against financial chaos.
You obviously have fear of inflation. Inflation tends to be good for gold. You also have fear of a more general nature. You have fear that there's political instability in the United States. You have fear that the role of the U.S. dollar is being undermined.
Let's say you had to take your money out of the United States in a hurry and there were capital controls, hard assets like precious metals, diamonds, things like that become more attractive in those types of situations. If I have my money in a bank account, it's subject to all sorts of controls on what I can do with it, transfer it out of the country.
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Chapter 7: Why are investors turning to gold and silver?
Americans love using their credit cards, the most secure and hassle-free way to pay. But D.C. politicians want to change that with the Durbin Marshall Credit Card Bill. This bill lets corporate megastores pick how your credit card is processed, allowing them to use untested payment networks that jeopardize your data security and rewards.
Corporate megastores will make more money, and you pay the price. Tell Congress to guard your card, because Americans lose when politicians choose. Learn more at GuardYourCard.com.
As President Trump's tariffs have gone into effect and then gone on pause, countries around the world have struggled with how to address them. And as we're exclusively reporting, some countries are turning to Goldman Sachs for advice. WSJ reporter Anna Maria Andriotis has the story.
So, Anna Maria, you report that South Africa, France, Saudi Arabia and Japan are some of the countries that have sought guidance from Goldman. Why from Goldman in particular?
A number of countries are speaking with various large U.S. banks that are viewed as having connectivity to the Trump administration. These talks in general are spread out across a number of banks. Goldman has for a very long time been known for its connections to U.S. government administrations, regardless of whether it's a Democrat or Republican who is in the White House.
And this time around, the same thing is at play. Countries are seeking advice. This is definitely a tumultuous time for a number of countries, whether large or small, as they try to figure out this new world order that's being put in place under the Trump administration. What is Goldman telling them to do?
So right now, of course, for the last few weeks, the topic has been on trade and tariffs and countries seeking advice on how to handle what's coming with tariffs during this 90-day pause.
So one of the things that I thought was most interesting here is that the discussions involve addressing certain issues both domestically as well as even their international relations with certain countries domestically. as a pathway to getting lower tariffs.
And so starting from at least late February until this month, there have been discussions between Goldman executives and South African government officials in which, as the South African government officials have been asking about
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