Good morning. Andrew here. We’re continuing to examine the fallout from the Supreme Court’s decision overturning many of President Trump’s tariffs. For the moment, the prevailing view — including among several C.E.O.s I spoke with who are assessing the ruling’s impact — appears to be that many tariffs will remain in place, not just the 150-day levies that Trump has imposed with Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974, but through other legal avenues as well. Still, the Supreme Court decision is likely to scramble, or at least slow down, some corporate investment plans. That may include commitments to reshore supply chains in the U.S. A major question mark now hangs over big commitments that other countries have made to spend money in the U.S., many of which remain unfulfilled. We go deep into all of it below; I also discuss these issues on today’s episode of “The Daily.” And if you’re in the Northeast hunkering down amid the storm, please stay safe and warm. (Was this newsletter forwarded to you? Sign up here.)
Disruption déjà vuTariff anxiety is back. European stocks are trading lower this morning, and the S&P 500 looks set to reverse its gains from Friday. (One bright spot is Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index — more on that below.) The administration has argued that the Supreme Court’s ruling on Friday against many of President Trump’s sweeping tariffs won’t derail his combative trade policy. But how that plays out is unclear. The latest: The Trump administration warned U.S. trading partners that their trade deals weren’t affected by the court’s ruling. “We expect our partners to stand by them,” Jamieson Greer, the United States trade representative, told “Face the Nation” yesterday. Trump has also set a global tariff rate at 15 percent, up from a recently declared 10 percent. But countries aren’t sitting still:
How long would the new 15 percent levies last? Though Greer called them “very durable,” they are based on a provision of a 1974 trade law known as Section 122 and expire after 150 days — unless Congress extends them. Given the upcoming U.S. midterm elections, and tariffs being deeply unpopular, lawmaker approval is uncertain at best. Businesses have questions, too. A big issue is the state of potential tariff refunds. Companies like Costco, Toyota, Goodyear and Alcoa have sought to reclaim levies they have paid, as have smaller importers. “Our firm’s phone, emails, et cetera have blown up” with clients seeking refund advice, Lenny Feldman, a managing partner of Sandler, Travis & Rosenberg, a law firm specializing in international trade, told DealBook on Friday after the court’s decision. He recommended that companies file for refunds. The refund question is expected to be resolved by the courts, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said yesterday. (Quinn Emanuel announced today that it had created a tariff refund litigation task force, a sign that Big Law sees a wave of such claims from their clients.) A refund windfall would be the equivalent of a huge economic stimulus, economists reckon. But “with new tariffs coming in, it seems unlikely anyone will rush to lower prices to their customers,” Paul Donovan, the chief economist for UBS Global Wealth Management, wrote in a research note today.
Novo Nordisk’s shares sink after its latest setback. The Danish drugmaker today reported that its next generation obesity injection achieved less weight loss than an existing drug made by its rival Eli Lilly. Novo Nordisk is a pioneer in marketing semaglutide-based weight loss drugs, but has since lost ground to Eli Lilly as it has struggled with production and other issues. Novo said it expected better results from higher-dose trials. A winter storm intensifies along the East Coast. More than 5,300 scheduled flights have been canceled, including nearly 90 percent of arrivals and departures at major New York area and Boston airports, and 40 million people remained under a blizzard warning from what could be a powerful “super bomb” cyclone. Public transportation in and around New York City has been delayed or halted. State of the Union and earnings take center stage. President Trump is set to deliver his annual address tomorrow, with the future of his tariffs a major discussion point. Elsewhere, Workday, whose shares have been battered by artificial intelligence competition worries, and Home Depot report quarterly results tomorrow; Lowe’s, Nvidia and Salesforce go on Wednesday; and CoreWeave on Thursday. Beijing’s stronger hand?President Trump is scheduled to fly to Beijing in a matter of weeks for high-stakes talks, The Times reported over the weekend. He is expected to push President Xi Jinping of China to increase purchases of American agricultural and industrial goods, while Beijing will most likely seek a détente on trade and the topic of Taiwan. But the Supreme Court’s tariff ruling on Friday may have blunted a potent Trump negotiating tool, Grady McGregor reports. The latest: The court decision removed a power he had used to impose stiff measures on a host of countries, including a 20 percent rate on China. That ruling could give Beijing more leverage in upcoming talks, Joe Mazur, an analyst at Trivium China, a policy research firm, told DealBook. “Any decision that removes a tactical weapon from the Trump administration’s hand is welcome news in Beijing,” he said. China’s Commerce Ministry said today that it was making a “full assessment” of the court’s decision. Trump has other options. The ruling may play only a limited role in negotiations, other analysts say, especially given the president’s willingness to pivot to other legal justifications for tariffs. Trump invoked another legal measure to impose new levies, a move that Beijing officials appeared to criticize. “From Beijing’s perspective, the legal vehicle matters less than the strategic direction,” said Henry Gao, a law professor at Singapore Management University. More aggressive measures remain on the table. They include ratcheting up export controls to further limit China’s access to advanced U.S. technology. Trump had appeared focused on building a “good relationship” with Beijing rather than continuing tit-for-tat measures, Mazur said. Will the Supreme Court ruling force the president to get more aggressive now? Beijing may see the ruling as supporting its long-term trade strategy. China leveraged rare earth exports to ultimately win concessions from Trump, including a temporary reprieve from tariffs. In recent weeks, it also rolled out the red carpet to U.S. allies, including the Canadian and British prime ministers, Mark Carney and Keir Starmer, whose countries have also faced tariffs.
Netflix and a new Trump threatToday is the deadline for Paramount to make its best-and-final takeover offer to Warner Bros. Discovery and persuade its fellow media company to walk away from Netflix. A big question is whether Paramount would increase its price. (Variety just reported that it may bump its bid to $32 a share.) But a new demand by President Trump raises the question of whether another Paramount argument — that its bid is more likely to win regulatory approval — is worth factoring in, too. Trump unexpectedly demanded that Netflix fire Susan Rice from its board. His anger appeared to arise from comments that Rice, a former top official in the Obama and Biden administrations, had made on the “Stay Tuned With Preet” podcast. She advised that Democrats, if they regain power, shouldn’t “forgive or forget” companies that “bent the knee” to Trump: Whether you’re a law firm, whether you’re a university, whether you’re a media entity, whether you’re a big corporation, whether you’re Big Tech, you need to play a long game, not this short game that has been so detrimental. After Laura Loomer, a right-wing agitator, flagged Rice’s comments, Trump wrote on social media, “Netflix should fire racist, Trump Deranged Susan Rice, IMMEDIATELY, or pay the consequences.” Does this meaningfully change the equation? It’s unclear — though few investors probably believed that Trump would stay out of the government’s review of the Netflix deal. (As Peter Kafka of Business Insider notes, the president said in December that he would be involved, and then later reversed course.) Many on Wall Street and Hollywood have questioned whether Trump would put pressure on the Justice Department, which is reviewing the Netflix deal on antitrust grounds. Netflix has insisted all along that its deal can pass antitrust muster and that Paramount’s offer carries its own competitive issues. Stay tuned for:
A lawsuit over Wall St. working hours endsA court battle that had Wall Street riveted is over before the fireworks really started. Centerview Partners, the prominent boutique investment bank, settled a lawsuit by a former analyst over its demands for long working hours. The case had threatened to take a longstanding issue in the banking world to perhaps its most public venue yet. The context: Kathryn Shiber said she had been fired just 10 weeks into a three-year analyst program. According to the lawsuit, which she filed in 2021, she had informed the firm that she had a medical condition that required her to sleep at least eight to nine hours a night consistently. Centerview initially gave her a work-free window from midnight to 9 a.m., according to the lawsuit, but then it told her that wasn’t working — and then that she should have known the contours of a junior M.&A. banker’s arduous schedule. The bank added that Shiber’s arrangement put more stress on other associates. Firms have moved to limit young workers’ round-the-clock schedules in recent decades. The issue returned to the fore in 2024, after a Bank of America junior banker and former Green Beret died of a blood clot after pulling several 100-hour work weeks in a month, though there’s no evidence that the workload led to his death. That year, The Wall Street Journal reported that Bank of America associates were told to ignore restrictions on their hours. After the death of the Bank of America associate, JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America introduced new measures to limit young bankers’ hours. Shiber’s lawsuit could have exposed financial details about Centerview, including revenues and profits. (The bank is privately held.) Top executives, including a president, Tony Kim, were set to testify, though the presiding judge rejected Shiber’s bid to put the Centerview co-founder Robert Pruzan on the stand. Centerview didn’t disclose terms of the settlement. But a spokesperson for the bank said in a statement that Shiber’s legal claims “have no merit” and that the firm was “confident we would have prevailed at trial.” We hope you’ve enjoyed this newsletter, which is made possible through subscriber support. Subscribe to The New York Times.
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