Plus: Why Stablecoin Issuers Could Displace Japan And China As The Biggest Buyers Of U.S. Treasury Securities |
Good morning,
The family behind Skechers is set to pocket over $1 billion from selling the comfortable footwear brand.Brazilian investment firm 3G Capital, which has previously invested in companies like Burger King and Tim Hortons, will spend nearly $9.5 billion to buy Skechers in a deal that will also take the company private. Robert Greenberg, a former hairstylist who tried to get rich off of everything from mail-order toupees to roller skates, founded the company with his son Michael in 1992 and the family still owns a 12% stake. The shoemaker reported a record $9 billion in revenue last year, though the deal comes in a precarious period for retailers amid tariffs. Nonetheless, 3G seems to be in it for the long haul.
Let’s get into the headlines, |
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| As President Donald Trump’s tariffs cause continued distress, Ford became the latest firm to pull its annual financial forecast Monday, in addition to truck engine maker Cummins. The automaker expects tariffs to reduce its earnings before interest and taxes by about $1.5 billion this year, and cited the “the potential for industrywide supply chain disruption.” Filming for some of the biggest blockbusters from this decade—from the Avatar franchise to Barbie—took place abroad, raising questions about the impacts of President Trump’s proposed 100% tariff on films produced outside the U.S. Film productions in the U.S. have declined in recent years, driven by the pandemic, labor strikes and financial incentives offered by locations abroad. MORE: California Governor Gavin Newsom said Monday that his home state was “all in to bring more production here” and that he wants to work with the Trump Administration to craft a $7.5 billion federal film tax incentive to support the entertainment industry, an alternative to the proposed tariffs. |
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|  | | illustration by yunjia yuan for forbes via GOOGLE GEMINI AI |
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Congress is racing to lay down the rules for stablecoins—blockchain-based tokens typically pegged to the U.S. dollar and, increasingly, the plumbing of global payments. Dueling bills in the House and Senate aim to bring stablecoin issuers into the regulatory fold, spelling out exactly how much capital, liquidity and risk management is enough. They also aim to clarify which federal or state agencies get to play referee. But there’s another, less flashy subplot: How will widespread acceptance of stablecoins among traditional institutions globally affect the $28 trillion U.S. Treasury market? Treasurys are the backbone of stablecoin reserves because not much else comes close in terms of safety and liquidity. If you’re offering a digital dollar, you need to back it with assets that are as close to risk-free as possible. This sounds a lot like hundreds of money market mutual funds, issued by giants like BlackRock, Fidelity and Vanguard, that hold over $6 trillion in assets—mostly in U.S. Treasury bills. But unlike a money market fund, stablecoin issuers have so far resisted offering any kind of yield or income to their holders. That’s one reason why Tether, the largest of them, has extremely high margins and reported over $1 billion in operating profit in the first quarter of 2025. Right now, the dozens of stablecoin issuers that exist hold about $150 billion in U.S. government debt. That’s a rounding error in the $28 trillion Treasury securities market and a fairly insignificant portion of the $6 trillion in Treasury bills outstanding. But Britain’s Standard Chartered Bank, which offers custody for cryptocurrencies, projects that the global stablecoin market could jump from $240 billion to $2 trillion in just three years.
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“The Trump Administration has argued that stablecoins could help secure the dollar’s global dominance, ensure higher demand for Treasurys and, in turn, lower U.S. borrowing costs,” says Forbes reporter Nina Bambysheva. “Still, some academics warn that embedding stablecoins into the Treasury market creates new vulnerabilities.”
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Berkshire Hathaway and its iconic leader Warren Buffett saw a rare but predictable setback Monday, as the investment firm’s shares slid 5% on the first day of trading since Buffett announced he would step down as CEO at the end of 2025. Buffett’s fortune shrank by nearly $9 billion to about $160 billion amid the selloff, according to Forbes’ estimates. |
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Alphabet’s Google has awarded Gamuda—a construction company cofounded by tycoon Lin Yun Ling—a contract worth $236 million to build a hyperscale data center in Malaysia. It’s the second deal Google has made with Gamuda, as Malaysia rapidly emerges as a key hub for data centers, with total investment commitments from major tech firms reaching more than $23 billion. |
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Presented by Philip Morris International
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We’re delivering a smoke-free future, today.
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At PMI, our mission is clear: to reduce smoking by replacing cigarettes with better smoke-free alternatives for legal-age adults who smoke. We’ve transformed to deliver a smoke-free world and are making significant progress.
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A new bipartisan Senate bill would raise the limit on loans for small businesses in manufacturing from $5 million to $10 million, a needed increase on the Small Business Administration’s 15-year-old cap, but still a far cry from the $50 million limit proposed in Project 2025. Bankers say the higher limit may help some manufacturers invest in equipment or expand facilities, but they don’t expect a flood of new factories due to President Donald Trump’s tariff uncertainty. The federal government will offer undocumented migrants $1,000 to leave the U.S., the Trump Administration’s latest effort to speed up its immigration agenda. The Department of Homeland Security estimates the program will decrease the cost of a deportation by 70%, down from an average of $17,121. |
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Amid DOGE’s efforts to slash the federal workforce, the IRS has been a major target. The cuts have impacted 11% of its workforce, including those who voluntarily resigned and those who received termination notices—and more are on the way. Some positions were affected more than others, like revenue agents, who audit tax returns. |
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$20.4 billion
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The market capitalization Netflix lost Monday morning
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1.94%
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The drop in Netflix stock at market close Monday
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51%
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The share of Netflix’s 2024 content budget that went to content sourced outside North America
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A key tenant of digital marketing from the last decade is shifting right before our eyes: Traditional search engine optimization, or SEO, is giving way to generative engine optimization, which is being referred to as “GEO.” For most businesses, the effects of ignoring GEO won’t be immediate—it will be a gradual decline in visibility and relevance. Early GEO best practices include: answering a customer’s most obvious questions first, using clear headings and simple language, and updating internal website files to allow reputable AI bots to crawl your content. |
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