Wall Street Capitulates to Trump’s Tariffs
It’s hard to say what finally broke Wall Street’s will. Maybe it was the retaliatory 34 percent tariff from Beijing, or the sight of Jerome Powell brushing off the carnage like a man who’d just changed a flat tire. Maybe it was the unmistakable conviction in Donald Trump’s voice when he said, “China played it wrong. They panicked.”
Or maybe it was the simple realization—years in the making, but somehow still a surprise—that this president is not going to hand back the steering wheel to the Chamber of Commerce.
Whatever the trigger, Friday felt like capitulation. Not just a selloff or a rout—though it was certainly that, with the Nasdaq down nearly six percent, the Dow off more than 2,200 points, and the S&P 500 hemorrhaging value like a biotech firm with a bad FDA call. No, this was something more specific: a…