Trump faces an increasingly tough crowd
President Trump won over Americans with a promise to return the country to “boom” times of low taxes and deregulation. Fifty days into office, he’s now pitching an economy in “a period of transition” for which he can’t rule out a recession.
His stay-patient message may get tested on Tuesday, when he is set to meet with members of the Business Roundtable, whose ranks include influential C.E.O.s — many of whose companies’ stocks have been hit hard by tariff-fueled market fears.
Stock futures are up a little n Tuesday — but still stung by Monday’s huge plunges. The S&P 500 is nearing a correction after falling roughly 2.7 percent, while the Nasdaq is performing even worse after another sharp drop.
Much of that is driven by worries about Trump’s economic policy, principally his on-again-off-again tariffs. The president is set to impose more levies as soon as Wednesday and has put companies and trading partners on notice that they won’t get exemptions.
Business leaders are getting increasingly worried. A new poll by Chief Executive magazine, conducted last week, found that C.E.O.s’ assessment of American business conditions was at its lowest level since Spring 2020. (It’s a stark contrast to far-rosier findings by a Conference Board survey last month.)
On Monday, Delta Air Lines cut its first-quarter sales forecast, blaming “the recent reduction in consumer and corporate confidence” driven by economic uncertainty. American Airlines this morning also warned of steeper losses as demand softens for leisure travel. And households are feeling gloomy about “their year-ahead financial situations,” the New York Fed’s monthly consumer survey found.
“Trump is off to a great start, so it’s disappointing to see his ‘dumb’ (as the WSJ said) tariff policy muddying the waters of where the U.S. and world economies are headed,” Don Ochsenreiter, the C.E.O. of Dollamur Sport Surfaces, told Chief Executive.
So far, Trump isn’t providing the clarity C.E.O.s want. In an interview with Maria Bartiromo of Fox News this weekend, he said that “we may go up with some tariffs. It depends. We may go up. I don’t think we’ll go down, or we may go up.”
He added that his levies strategy could take “a little time” to bear results.
How much time does he have? The “Trump bump” in the markets has become a “Trump slump” as fears grow that the trade war could reignite inflation and slow the economy.
Trump told reporters last week that he was “not even looking at the market,” suggesting that one of the most reliable checks on his behavior wasn’t working this time around. That could make Tuesday’s C.E.O. meeting a tough one for the corporate chiefs in the room.
HERE’S WHAT’S HAPPENING
Ukraine hits Moscow with a powerful drone attack ahead of truce talks. The bombardment, which the Russian authorities said had killed at least two and injured 18, appeared meant to remind Russia that Ukraine could still hit back despite reduced support from the United States. Delegations from Kyiv and Washington sat down in Saudi Arabia on Tuesday to discuss a path to ending the war, after President Trump and Volodymyr Zelensky’s confrontation in the Oval Office last month.
Amazon Prime will stream “The Apprentice.” The decision to air seven seasons of President Trump’s former hit reality show — which premiered in 2004, supercharged his fame and helped vault him to the White House — underscores the tech giant’s efforts to get closer to the commander in chief. Trump, who was an executive producer of “The Apprentice,” is likely to receive royalties from the agreement. He plugged the deal on Truth Social.
Nissan replaces its C.E.O. after failed deal talks with Honda. Makoto Uchida, who has led the Japanese carmaker since 2019, will step down on April 1 and be succeeded by Ivan Espinosa, the company’s chief planning officer. Nissan has struggled with sluggish sales and earlier this year failed to strike a merger with Honda. Separately, The Times reports that Eric Schmidt, the former longtime C.E.O. of Google, has taken on his first chief executive role since leaving the tech giant: at Relativity Space, an upstart rocket company.
Tough questions confront key Musk businesses
Coming into 2025, Elon Musk appeared to be riding high given his growing political clout and the soaring fortunes of Tesla and his other businesses.
Now Tesla’s stock has tumbled below its pre-Election Day levels, having plunged 15 percent on Monday alone in its worst drop in half a decade. Companies like SpaceX and others have faced their own struggles. And speculation has grown about potential limits to his political reach.
While Musk conceded to Fox Business Network’s Larry Kudlow that he’s handling this “with great difficulty,” he professed that he was still feeling optimistic. But these recent challenges raise questions about some of the tech mogul’s companies, including Tesla and SpaceX.
Yes, Musk has had a tough several days. Among the most recent developments were the slide in Tesla shares (which Reid Hoffman, the Democratic billionaire tech mogul, poked fun at); the explosion of another of SpaceX’s Starships during a test flight; and an outage at X that Musk attributed to Ukraine, a target of his criticism.
Musk continues to draw support from President Trump, even after the tech mogul clashed with Secretary of State Marco Rubio at a recent Cabinet meeting. “To Republicans, Conservatives, and all great Americans, Elon Musk is ‘putting it on the line’ in order to help our Nation, and he is doing a FANTASTIC JOB!” the president wrote on Truth Social overnight. He added, “I’m going to buy a brand new Tesla tomorrow morning as a show of confidence and support.”
Musk also appeared to be committed to his government cost-cutting work. He told Kudlow that the Department of Government Efficiency worked “in consultation” with Cabinet secretaries, and that he planned to double the group’s staff to 200. (That’s despite the Trump administration saying the billionaire isn’t in charge.) The entrepreneur added that he planned to stay on for at least another year.
But the run of bad news at Tesla and SpaceX is raising concerns. Tesla’s dropping stock price is likely to amplify calls by some shareholders that Musk spend less time focusing on Washington and more on the carmaker.
And SpaceX’s latest failed test flight, which produced a shower of debris that delayed flights around Florida and the Caribbean, has spurred questions about potential delays in the rocket giant’s development process — and whether it faces growing political liabilities.
Big Law comes to a Delaware overhaul’s defense
As Delaware lawmakers prepare to hold hearings tomorrow about a bill that could reshape corporate America, some of the biggest corporate law firms are coming out in favor of it, DealBook’s Lauren Hirsch is first to report.
Today, 21 corporate law firms — including Simpson Thacher and Bartlett; Cravath, Swaine & Moore; and Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison — will publish a letter strongly supporting legislation that would override a series of decisions by the Delaware Court of Chancery. These rulings have sparked backlash from companies and led many, including Meta, to contemplate moving their incorporation outside of the state.
The letter’s argument: The bill is “an important step in maintaining Delaware’s status as the jurisdiction of choice for sophisticated clients when they create companies,” the law firms write.
Some background: Delaware has been ensnared in controversy after several rulings, including Chancellor Kathaleen McCormick’s decision last year to nullify a big payout for Elon Musk at Tesla. While Musk’s ire over that decision brought attention to the chancery court, many corporate lawyers say they’re more broadly frustrated with the court’s treatment of companies with controlling shareholders, arguing that it has been overly deferential to noncontrolling shareholders.
Given how corporate America fuels Delaware’s budget, a group of Delaware state senators last month proposed a bill to amend the state constitution that would effectively override years of case law by the Delaware Court of Chancery. The group sidestepped the usual process for proposing bills, allowing it to move swiftly — but critics say that it also left out early input from key members of the influential Delaware bar.
The issue was a major topic at Tulane University’s Corporate Law Institute conference, a big gathering of deal makers held last week in New Orleans. “We are disempowering Delaware courts,” said Ned Weinberger of the plaintiffs’ law firm Labaton Keller Sucharow, arguing the amendment would erode the voice of minority shareholders.
Scott Barshay, a partner at Paul, Weiss and a top deal maker, said the amendment would help stop a corporate exodus from Delaware. “It’s very important that this legislation gets passed,” he said onstage.
The letter was born out of sideline conversations at the conference. It argues that, despite the relatively unusual intervention by the Delaware legislature, a response to corporate angst is not unprecedented.
“Over its long history at the epicenter of American corporate law, Delaware has repeatedly adjusted its approach in order to modernize and respond to market developments,” the lawyers write.
Who’s in — and who’s out: Other law firms that signed the letter include Kirkland & Ellis; Latham & Watkins; and Weil, Gotshal & Manges.
Corporate law insiders will notice one major law firm that didn’t sign: Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, where Leo Strine Jr., a former chancellor of the Court of Chancery, is of counsel. (That said, Martin Lipton, one of the firm’s founders, wrote in support of the bill shortly after its release.)
At the conference, Strine allowed that more companies have become concerned about unpredictability in Delaware courts. Separately, David Katz, a senior M.&A. partner at Wachtell, said the bill wasn’t connected to Musk’s criticism of Delaware, a common critique of it.
THE SPEED READ
Deals
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Redfin’s stock soared on Monday after Rocket Companies agreed to buy the property listing platform for $1.75 billion in stock. (Reuters)
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Skydance accused a latecomer bidder for Paramount of fraud, asserting that the bidder was “hijacking” the regulatory approval process for its deal. (Deadline)
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The law firm Paul Hastings recruited Eric Schiele, a top deal maker at Kirkland & Ellis, to help lead its M.&A. practice. (WSJ)
Politics, policy and regulation
Best of the rest
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Ruth Marcus, an opinion columnist and editor at The Washington Post, said that she’s quitting after the newspaper’s publisher killed a column criticizing the new direction of its editorial page. (NYT)
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“Hollywood Pivots to Programming for Trump’s America” (WSJ)
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