Raphael Stevens

More stories

  • 150 Shares169 Views

    in Business

    4-time NBA champion Stephen Curry says even he suffers from impostor syndrome

    Stephen Curry is a two-time National Basketball Association Most Valuable Player, a four-time league champion and among the greatest shooters of all time.
    Yet, even the Golden State Warriors star suffers from impostor syndrome and said he grew up with an underdog mentality.
    In addition to his basketball accolades, Curry owns a media company, a bourbon brand, a golf league for kids and a philanthropic foundation that gives back to students in Oakland, California.

    Stephen Curry is a two-time National Basketball Association Most Valuable Player, a four-time league champion and among the greatest shooters of all time.
    He also owns a media company, a bourbon brand, a golf league for kids and a philanthropic foundation that gives back to students in Oakland, California.

    Yet, even the Golden State Warriors star suffers from impostor syndrome.
    “I’m human,” Curry said in an interview for “Curry Inc.,” a CNBC Sport production centered on Curry’s career and business ambitions. “Like everybody, you have doubts about yourself, you have impostor syndrome at times.”

    Stephen Curry, #30 of the Golden State Warriors celebrates with his dad, Dell Curry, after winning Game 6 of the 2022 NBA Finals at TD Garden in Boston, Massachusetts.
    Jesse D. Garrabrant | National Basketball Association | Getty Images

    Curry is the son of former NBA star Dell Curry, who played 16 seasons in the NBA.
    While Stephen grew up on the sidelines watching his dad play, he says because of his stature and underdog mentality, he didn’t grow up with the expectation to play in the league.
    “I couldn’t have dreamt this,” said Curry, who was selected as the No. 7 overall pick in the 2009 NBA draft and went on to become the all-time greatest 3-point shooter in NBA history.

    CNBC Sport’s documentary “Curry Inc.: The Business of Stephen Curry” will premiere on CNBC on Wednesday, June 4, at 9 p.m. ET.

    The 11-time NBA All-Star says he has embraced his underdog status and used it as motivation throughout his tenure at Davidson College and into his time in the NBA.

    Stephen Curry, #30 of the Davidson Wildcats, directs the offense against the Kansas Jayhawks during the Midwest Regional Final of the 2008 NCAA Division I Men’s Basketball Tournament at Ford Field in Detroit, Michigan, on March 30, 2008. Kansas won 59-57.
    Gregory Shamus | Getty Images Sport | Getty Images

    “Matching the God-given abilities and the work ethic and just being able to lose myself in the game I think is a good formula,” Curry said.
    Off the court, Curry has similarly found success. He heads Thirty Ink, a house of brands that includes his different business ventures across entertainment, marketing, fitness, lifestyle and technology.
    He’s also passionate about giving back. Through his nonprofit Eat. Learn. Play., Curry has raised $20 million for Oakland schools over the past five years.
    There is also the Underrated Golf Tour, where Curry works to get minorities out on the links in a traditionally white sport.
    “From a national perspective, a lot of the narrative is trying to peel back programs and opportunities that are allowing people to have just a fair shot and a fair chance. Everything that we do and what I can control is about true equity,” he said.
    With all these commitments on his plate, Curry said he grapples with whether he is fulfilling his full potential in all the different areas of his life.
    “We all like to be a better husband, a better father, more present at times, just because we’re pulled — I’m pulled — in a lot of different areas,” Curry said.
    As CNBC followed Curry around NBA All-Star Weekend in February, Curry said he has embraced the pressure that comes with being a star basketball player and a public figure.
    “All of these realties are wild to me, and sometimes you just gotta get out of your own way and enjoy it,” he added. More

  • 188 Shares109 Views

    in Business

    Stephen Curry considers broadcasting, team ownership and PGA Tour Champions as NBA retirement inches closer

    Stephen Curry is the CEO of Thirty Ink, a conglomerate of businesses including Unanimous Media, Gentleman’s Cut bourbon and 7k marketing consultancy.
    While Curry plans to take a more central role running Thirty Ink after he retires from the NBA, he’s also considering careers in broadcasting, team ownership and professional golf.
    Curry spoke to CNBC Sport as part of the TV production “Curry Inc.: The Business of Stephen Curry.”

    Stephen Curry isn’t retiring from the National Basketball Association yet, but he’s already thinking about new career paths — including broadcasting, team ownership and playing on the PGA Tour Champions.
    The Golden State Warriors star spoke to CNBC Sport as part of “Curry Inc.: The Business of Stephen Curry,” a television production centered on Curry’s career and business ambitions.

    CNBC Sport’s documentary “Curry Inc.: The Business of Stephen Curry” will premiere on CNBC on Wednesday, June 4, at 9 p.m. ET.

    Curry, 37, already has one post-NBA job waiting for him. He’s the CEO of Thirty Ink, a mini-conglomerate of businesses including Unanimous Media, the bourbon brand Gentleman’s Cut and 7k marketing consultancy. He plans to take a more central role running the business on a day-to-day basis when he retires from professional basketball, he told CNBC Sport.

    Stephen Curry, #30 of the Golden State Warriors, drives to the basket against Dyson Daniels, #11 of the New Orleans Pelicans, at Chase Center in San Francisco on April 12, 2024.
    Kavin Mistry | Getty Images

    Still, Curry is thinking beyond his company. He’s looking to follow in the footsteps of Michael Jordan, who owned the Charlotte Hornets from 2010 to 2023 — the only former NBA player to hold a majority stake in a team.
    “He might be the only one in our generation who has sat in that seat and done it that way,” Curry said. “The idea of being a part of an ownership group and the right opportunity that allows me to have an impact on how a franchise should be operated — how you’re going after true winning, like we’ve done here with the Warriors — that’s something I’m excited about pursuing. It’s interesting. Obviously, as an active player, you can’t participate in that level until you’re done. So you’ll see me in the seat somewhere down the road.”

    Former Charlotte Hornets owner Michael Jordan responds to a question during a news conference at Spectrum Center in Charlotte, North Carolina, on Oct. 28, 2014.
    Jeff Siner | Tribune News Service | Getty Images

    Curry noted that he may not be able to afford majority ownership with rising NBA valuations. The average NBA team is worth $4.66 billion, according to CNBC Sport’s official 2025 valuations. 
    “Obviously there are levels to this,” Curry said.

    Curry is an investor in Unrivaled, the women’s 3-on-3 basketball league, and has said he also has interest in buying a Women’s National Basketball Association team.
    Sportico named Curry the second-highest paid athlete in the world last year, earning an estimated $153.8 million between salary and endorsements. Forbes estimates Jordan’s net worth is around $3.5 billion.
    Curry agreed to a one-year, $62.6 million extension with the Golden State Warriors last year, keeping him under team control until 2027. He made more than $55 million in salary for the 2024-25 season, and he’s the first player in NBA history to make $40 million, $50 million and $60 million in a season. He has had the highest base salary in the league since 2017.

    Broadcasting aspirations

    Curry has used his venture Unanimous Media to springboard a career in front of the camera. He has appeared in several projects including the Peacock sitcom “Mr. Throwback” and the Apple TV+ documentary “Stephen Curry: Underrated.”
    Still, he could likely make millions by joining an NBA studio show on NBC, ESPN or Amazon Prime Video when he retires. Curry said he would “for sure” consider a broadcasting job, though he won’t rush into it.
    “I would be more patient,” said Curry, who noted former National Football League quarterback Tom Brady moved directly into the Fox broadcast booth after retirement and his current teammate Draymond Green has been a TNT Sports NBA analyst for years as an active player.
    “I think about what would be the right opportunity for me, ’cause anything that I do, I want to be all in on it,” Curry said. “Right now, just doing your homework on the different pathways and options that might be available.”

    Senior golf tour

    Curry said he’s also already contemplating a career playing on the PGA Tour Champions, the top tour for former PGA players over 50 years old.
    The concept of Curry competing with pros for championships may seem farcical, but he’s taking it seriously. It’s a long way off — Curry turns 50 in 13 years — but he is a scratch golfer without dedicating his life to playing.
    He won the 2023 American Century Championship, an annual celebrity tournament that takes place each summer in Lake Tahoe, Nevada, defeating other current and former professional athletes that are top golfers. Curry shot a final round 72 to win the tournament.
    “That would be a fun goal to go after for sure,” Curry said. “It’s an extremely challenging tour to crack if you’re not one of the champion ex-PGA guys that are making that jump after you turn 50. So to do all the qualifying journey and all that — I’m pretty sure I’ll try it. I’ve seen guys who are preparing themselves to do the same thing.”
    Disclosure: NBCUniversal is the parent company of Peacock and CNBC. More

  • 113 Shares129 Views

    in Business

    How Under Armour signed Stephen Curry away from Nike

    In 2013, Stephen Curry shocked the sneaker world by signing with then-upstart apparel company Under Armour over basketball powerhouse Nike.
    The deal was considered a defining moment in Curry’s business career.
    In 2023, Under Armour signed a long-term extension with Curry and made him president of the newly formed Curry Brand, housed under the company’s banner.

    In 2013, Stephen Curry shocked the sneaker world by signing with then-upstart athletic company Under Armour over basketball powerhouse Nike.
    At the time, Nike controlled the vast majority of the NBA sneaker market. Under Armour was virtually unheard of in the basketball space.

    “We’re the underdog brand. We’re for the ones that were maybe born not big enough or tall enough or fast enough, or strong enough, or smart enough or clever enough,” said Under Armour founder and CEO Kevin Plank.

    CNBC Sport’s documentary “Curry Inc.: The Business of Stephen Curry” will premiere on CNBC on Wednesday, June 4, at 9 p.m. ET.

    The deal was considered a defining moment in Curry’s business career, and it got done in part thanks to Curry’s locker mate at the Golden State Warriors, Kent Bazemore.

    Stephen Curry, #30, and Kent Bazemore, #26 of the Golden State Warriors, celebrate defeating the Memphis Grizzlies 113-101 at Chase Center in San Francisco on May 16, 2021.
    Thearon W. Henderson | Getty Images Sport | Getty Images

    Plank wanted Curry to be the brand’s first big star. But he knew that to sign someone of Curry’s caliber, the company needed to think outside the box.
    “We actually targeted Ken, and we just said we’re going to overwhelm Ken with more like shock and awe of product, service, story, love, hug,” Plank said in an interview for “Curry Inc.,” a CNBC Sport production centered on Curry’s career and business ambitions. “About three months into the Warriors’ season, and Curry is looking next door at Ken. He’s like, ‘Who’s this brand that you get all this attention of? Because I’m with Nike, and I really am not.'”

    Stephen Curry’s new role will be as President of the Curry Brand.
    Source: Under Armour

    Under Armour’s Curry Brand

    It wasn’t just Bazemore’s influence that landed Curry at Under Armour.

    There was also a botched Nike presentation in which company executives mispronounced his first name and used a recycled slide deck that still had Kevin Durant’s name on it. Plus, Under Armour offered Curry a deal worth $4 million a year, while Nike offered $2.5 million — and declined to match.
    Today, 12 years later, Curry has made a dozen different shoes for Baltimore-based Under Armour and has developed a line of signature products that includes footwear and apparel. In 2023, the brand signed a new long-term extension and made Curry the president of the newly formed Curry Brand, housed under the company’s banner.
    As part of that deal, the 11-time NBA All-Star was given 8.8 million Under Armour common shares, valued at $75 million at the time, in addition to other awards and incentives.
    While Curry has profited handsomely from his success at Under Armour, the brand has had its share of ups and downs. Changes in leadership, strategy and competition have led to dramatic declines in Under Armour’s common stock price from an all-time high of $45.41 in 2016 to its current price of less than $6 per share.
    Some speculate the turmoil has hindered Curry’s off-court prospects.
    “In all honesty, if he would have stayed with Nike, his business would be a monster right now. A monster,” said Nico Harrison, general manager of the Dallas Mavericks who was Nike’s sports marketing director from 2002-2021, during a 2022 interview.

    Elevating the under

    Curry told CNBC that his relationship with Under Armour changed the way he thought about his off-court business.
    “It was the first time I really took an equity position in the company, and then you started to understand how every decision that you make and how you leverage not just the brand of me, but all the resources and opportunities I have around me to create value,” he said.
    Curry also said Under Armour’s underdog message resonated with him. Curry, at just 6-foot-2 and 185 pounds, isn’t the typical size of an NBA superstar.
    “The NBA was a goal, but I wasn’t like plotting my way to get there,” Curry said. “I was just enjoying every step of the way.”
    He has carried over the same mentality to his other businesses with a mantra of “elevate the under.”
    As part of his contract with Under Armour, a portion of the Curry Brand’s yearly revenue is invested in under-resourced communities, such as Oakland, California. Curry became connected to Oakland after moving there when he first became a Warrior in 2009. 
    During NBA All-Star Weekend in February, Curry and Under Armour celebrated their 20th court refurbishment at Oakland’s McClymonds High School. The school received NBA-grade hardwood floors, new hoops, backboards and scoreboards.
    Under Armour says the Curry Brand has trained 15,000 coaches, supported 125 basketball programs and had an impact on 300,000 kids around the world.
    Curry has also helped pave the way for minorities in golf through his Underrated Golf Tour. Sponsors like Under Armour fund a series of regional tournaments to boost junior golfers of color.
    “The way that I tried to be a trailblazer on the court, we want to do the exact same thing … leveraging that impact when it comes to what it does for the community,” Curry said. More

  • 138 Shares169 Views

    in Finance

    Investors are piling into big, short Treasury bets alongside Warren Buffett

    Fixed-income investors are steering clear of longer-term Treasuries amid volatility in bond yields and prices.
    Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway is reported to now own 5% of the short-term T-bill market.
    Ultra-short bond ETFs have been among the most popular exchange-traded funds with investors in 2025.

    Investors always pay close attention to bonds, and what the latest movement in prices and yields is saying about the economy. Right now, the action is telling investors to stick to the shorter-end of the fixed-income market with their maturities.
    “There’s lots of concern and volatility, but on the short and middle end, we’re seeing less volatility and stable yields,” Joanna Gallegos, CEO and founder of bond ETF company BondBloxx, said on CNBC’s “ETF Edge.”

    The 3-month T-Bill right now is paying above 4.3%, annualized. The two-year is paying 3.9% while the 10-year is offering about 4.4%. 
    ETF flows in 2025 show that it’s the ultrashort opportunity that is attracting the most investors. The iShares 0-3 Month Treasury Bond ETF (SGOV) and SPDR Bloomberg 1-3 T-Bill ETF (BIL) are both among the top 10 ETFs in investor flows this year, taking in over $25 billion in assets. Only Vanguard Group’s S&P 500 ETF (VOO) has taken in more new money from investors this year than SGOV, according to ETFAction.com data. Vanguard’s Short Term Bond ETF (BSV) is not far behind, with over $4 billion in flows this year, placing within the top 20 among all ETFs in year-to-date flows.
    “Long duration just doesn’t work right now” said Todd Sohn, senior ETF and technical strategist at Strategas Securities, on “ETF Edge.”
    It would seem that Warren Buffett agrees, with Berkshire Hathaway doubling its ownership of T-bills and now owning 5% of all short-term Treasuries, according to a recent JPMorgan report. 

    Stock chart icon

    Investors including Warren Buffett have been piling into short term Treasuries.

    “The volatility has been on the long end,” Gallegos said. “The 20-year has gone from negative to positive five times so far this year,” she added.

    The bond volatility comes nine months after the Fed began cutting rates, a campaign it has since paused amid concerns about the potential for resurgent inflation due to tariffs. Broader market concerns about government spending and deficit levels, especially with a major tax cut bill on the horizon, have added to bond market jitters. 
    Long-term treasuries and long-term corporate bonds have posted negative performance since September, which is very rare, according to Sohn. “The only other time that’s happened in modern times was during the Financial Crisis,” he said. “It is hard to argue against short-term duration bonds right now,” he added. 
    Sohn is advising clients to steer clear of anything with a duration of longer than seven years, which has a yield in the 4.1% range right now.
    Gallegos says she is concerned that amid the bond market volatility, investors aren’t paying enough attention to fixed income as part of their portfolio mix. “My fear is investors are not diversifying their portfolios with bonds today, and investors still have an equity addiction to concentrated broad-based indexes that are overweight certain tech names. They get used to these double-digit returns,” she said. 
    Volatility in the stock market has been high this year as well. The S&P 500 rose to record levels in February, before falling 20%, hitting a low in April, and then making back all of those losses more recently. While bonds are an important component of long-term investing to shield a portfolio from stock corrections, Sohn said now is also a time for investors to look beyond the United States within their equity positions. 
    “International equities are contributing to portfolios like they haven’t done in a decade” he said. “Last year was Japanese equities, this year it is European equities. Investors don’t have to be loaded up on U.S. large cap growth right now,” he said.
    The S&P 500 posted 20 percent-plus returns in both 2023 and 2024.
    The iShares MSCI Eurozone ETF (EZU) is up 25% so far this year.  The iShares MSCI Japan ETF (EWJ) posted performance above 25% in the two-year period prior to 2025, and is up over 10% this year. 

    Stock chart icon

    Overseas assets have become more popular. More

  • 63 Shares199 Views

    in Finance

    Will the UAE break OPEC?

    On May 31st the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and its allies (OPEC+) said that it would pump 411,000 more barrels per day (b/d) of crude in July. The statement marked the third such rise in as many months. OPEC+’s increased production is equivalent to 1.2% of global demand, and represents a drastic acceleration from plans drawn up last year, when the group said that it would raise output by 122,000 b/d a month. More

  • 150 Shares169 Views

    in Finance

    JPMorgan hired NOAA’s chief scientist to advise clients on navigating climate change

    Sarah Kapnick started her career in 2004 as an investment banking analyst, but was struck by how little climate change was being factored into financial decision making.
    She later became the chief science officer at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)
    Last year, JPMorgan hired Kapnick back into banking, where she’s advising clients on how to invest in climate change.

    Sarah Kapnick started her career in 2004 as an investment banking analyst for Goldman Sachs. She was struck almost immediately by the overlap of financial growth and climate change, and the lack of client advisory around that theme.
    Integrating the two, she thought, would help investors understand both the risks and opportunities, and would help them use climate information in finance and business operations. With a degree in theoretical mathematics and geophysical fluid dynamics, Kapnick saw herself as uniquely positioned to take on that challenge.

    But first, she had to get deeper into the science.
    That led her to more study and then to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the nation’s scientific and regulatory agency within the U.S. Department of Commerce. Its defined mission is to understand and predict changes in climate, weather, oceans and coasts and to share that knowledge and information with others.
    In 2022, Kapnick was appointed NOAA’s chief scientist. Two years later, JPMorgan Chase hired her away, but not as chief sustainability officer, a role common at most large investment banks around the world and a position already filled at JPMorgan.
    Rather, Kapnick is JPMorgan’s global head of climate advisory, a unique job she envisioned back in 2004.
    Just days before the official start of the North American hurricane season, CNBC spoke with Kapnick from her office at JPMorgan in New York about her current role at the bank and how she’s advising and warning clients.

    Here’s the Q&A: 
    (This interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity.) 
    Diana Olick, CNBC: Why does JPMorgan need you?
    Sarah Kapnick, JPMorgan global head of climate advisory: JPMorgan and banks need climate expertise because there is client demand for understanding climate change, understanding how it affects businesses, and understanding how to plan. Clients want to understand how to create frameworks for thinking about climate change, how to think about it strategically, how to think about it in terms of their operations, how to think about it in terms of their diversification and their long-term business plans.
    Everybody’s got a chief sustainability officer. You are not that. What is the difference?
    The difference is, I come with a deep background in climate science, but also how that climate science translates into business, into the economy. Working at NOAA for most of my career, NOAA is a science agency, but it’s science agency under the Department of Commerce. And so my job was to understand the future due to physics, but then be able to translate into what does that mean for the economy? What does that mean for economic development? What does that mean for economic output, and how do you use that science to be able to support the future of commerce? So I have this deep thinking that combines all that science, all of that commerce thinking, that economy, how it translates into national security. And so it wraps up all these different issues that people are facing right now and the systematic issues, so that they can understand, how do you navigate through that complexity, and then how do you move forward with all that information at hand?
    Give us an example, on a ground level, of what some of that expertise does for investors.
    There’s a client that’s concerned about the future of wildfire risk, and so they’re asking, How is wildfire risk unfolding? Why is it not in building codes? How might building codes change in the future? What happens for that? What type of modeling is used for that, what type of observations are used for that? So I can explain to them the whole flow of where is the data? How is the data used in decisions, where do regulations come from. How are they evolving? How might they evolve in the future? So we can look through the various uncertainties of different scenarios of what the world looks like, to make decisions about what to do right now, to be able to prepare for that, or to be able to shift in that preparation over time as uncertainty comes down and more information is known
    So are they making investment decisions based on your information?
    Yes, they’re making investment decisions. And they’re making decisions of when to invest because sometimes they have a knowledge of something as it’s starting to evolve. They want to act either early or they want to act as more information is known, but they want to know kind of the whole sphere of what the possibilities are and when information will be known or could be known, and what are the conditions that they will know more information, so they can figure out when they want to act, when that threshold of information is that they need to act.
    How does that then inform their judgment on their investment, specifically on wildfire?
    Because wildfire risk is growing, there’ve been a few events like the Los Angeles wildfires that were recently seen. The questions that I’m getting are could this happen in my location? When will it happen? Will I have advanced notice? How should I change and invest in my infrastructure? How should I think about differences in my infrastructure, my infrastructure construction? Should I be thinking about insurance, different types of insurance? How should I be accessing the capital markets to do this type of work? It’s questions across a range of trying to figure out how to reduce vulnerability, how to reduce financial exposure, but then also, if there are going to be risks in this one location, maybe there are more opportunities in these other locations that are safer, and I should be thinking of them as well. It’s holistically across risk management and thinking through risk and what to do about it, but then also thinking about what opportunities might be emerging as a result of this change in physical conditions in the world.
    But you’re not an economist. Do you work with others at JPMorgan to augment that?
    Yes, my work is very collaborative. I work across various teams with subject matter experts from different sectors, different industries, different parts of capital, and so I come with my expertise of science and technology and policy and security, and then work with them in whatever sphere that they’re in to be able to deliver the most to the bank that we can for our clients.
    With the cuts by the Trump administration to NOAA, to FEMA, to all of the information gathering sources — we’re not seeing some of the things that we normally see in data. How is that affecting your work?
    I am looking to what is available for what we need, for whatever issue. I will say that if data is no longer available, we will translate and move into other data sets, use other data sets, and I’m starting to see the development out in certain parts of the private sector to pull in those types of data that used to be available elsewhere. I think that we’re going to see this adjustment period where people search out whatever data it is they need to answer the questions that they have. And there will be opportunities. There’s a ton of startups that are starting to develop in that area, as well as more substantial companies that have some of those data sets. They’re starting to make them available, but there’s going to be this adjustment period as people figure out where they’re going to get the information that they need, because many market decisions or financial decisions are based on certain data sets that people thought would always be there.
    But the government data was considered the top, irrefutable, best data there was. Now, how do we know, when going to the private sector, that this data is going to be as credible as government data?
    There’s going to be an adjustment period as people figure out what data sets to trust and what not to trust, and what they want to be using. This is a point in time where there is going to be adjustment because something that everyone got used to working with, they now won’t have that. And that is a question that I’m getting from a lot of clients, of what data set should I be looking for? How should I be assessing this problem? Do I build in-house teams now to be able to assess this information that I didn’t have before? And I’m starting to see that occurring across different sectors, where people are increasingly having their own meteorologist, their own climatologist, to be able to help guide them through some of these decisions.
    Final thoughts?
    Climate change isn’t something that is going to happen in the future and impact finance in the future. It’s something that is a future risk that is now actually finding us in the bottom line today. More

  • 138 Shares149 Views

    in Business

    Here are the retailers raising prices as Trump tariffs take hold

    President Donald Trump has jolted retailers with his ever-changing tariff policies in recent months.
    Investors have raised one question again and again on quarterly earnings calls in recent weeks: Will consumers see price hikes this year in response to tariffs?
    Retailers like Costco and Best Buy said they have already raised some prices, while Walmart, Target and Macy’s plan to follow suit.

    A person picks out clothing in a store as retailers compete to attract shoppers and try to maintain margins on Black Friday, one of the busiest shopping days of the year, at Woodbury Common Premium Outlets in Central Valley, New York, U.S. November 24, 2023. 
    Vincent Alban | Reuters

    Consumers who hoped tariffs would not hit their wallets keep getting bad news.
    As they reported earnings in recent weeks, multiple major retailers said they have already raised some prices or plan to hike them in the coming weeks to offset the duties. They include major grocers and consumer goods sellers Costco, Best Buy, Walmart and Target.

    President Donald Trump’s ever-changing trade policy has roiled retailers as they try to plan their supply chains. On earnings calls, they faced the difficult task of trying to appease investors who want them to protect their bottom lines and shoppers who could balk at price hikes.
    In some cases, companies have been explicit, citing the estimated toll tariffs will take on their bottom lines and breaking down which countries their supply chains rely on. Other retailers have been less forthcoming, avoiding the word “tariff” and instead blaming strategy shifts or price hikes on “macroeconomic uncertainty” — or simply refusing to point the finger at all.
    Many retailers have reduced or withdrawn their full-year guidance because of tariffs. Companies such as Abercrombie & Fitch, Macy’s and Best Buy have slashed their profit outlooks. Meanwhile, American Eagle, Canada Goose, Ross and Mattel pulled their full-year guidance.
    After Trump implemented steep tariffs on dozens of countries in April, his administration has temporarily cut them to lower — but still significant — levels. Imports from China face a 30% duty, while goods from many other nations are subject to a 10% duty. A federal trade court struck down many of those tariffs on Wednesday, only for an appeals court to reinstate them, adding to the uncertainty retailers face.
    Economists on both sides of the aisle agree that tariffs are inflationary and the cost will likely be passed on to consumers, though government data has not showed a clear effect yet. A majority, 68%, of U.S. CEOs say they have either increased prices already or are considering doing so this year in the face of tariffs, according to a new survey by Chief Executive Group and AlixPartners.

    Here’s a breakdown of what several major retailers have said about their plans to raise prices as a way to mitigate the tariff impact.
    Brands that have already raised some prices

    Customers look over personal health items displayed on April 18, 2025 at a Costco branch in Niantic, Connecticut.
    Robert Nickelsberg | Getty Images

    Costco
    Executives of the warehouse club retailer told investors on Thursday that tariffs have forced the company to tweak its supply chain and raise prices in some cases. Costco has absorbed tariff costs for some goods, while it has increased prices in other instances, said CFO Gary Millerchip. For example, he said the retailer has held prices steady for staple items like bananas and pineapples sourced from Central and South America. Meanwhile, it has raised prices on flowers from those regions, since shoppers buy those less frequently.
    Best Buy
    Best Buy has already raised prices on some items to offset tariff costs, CEO Corie Barry said on a call with reporters. Changes took effect by mid-May. She declined to say which items are affected and called price hikes “the very last resort” for Best Buy.
    SharkNinja
    On SharkNinja’s latest earnings call in May, CEO Mark Barrocas said the company has already increased prices for several of its key products in response to tariffs and will “continue to look for additional opportunities” to do so. As an example, he said the company recently raised the price of one of its Ninja espresso machines from $499 to $549 and saw “no degradation in demand.” Some price hikes will stick and others will be dialed back, he said, depending on how consumers react.
    In a March interview, Barrocas told CNBC that nearly all of the company’s production will be moved out of China by the end of 2025.
    Newell Brands
    Executives from Newell Brands, which owns stroller company Graco as well as Rubbermaid, Yankee Candle, Paper Mate and Sharpie, said during an April 30 earnings call that the company has raised prices on its baby gear by about 20%. The company said it is equipped to handle Trump’s tariffs, unless he raises duties on imports from China again, since the majority of baby gear sold in the U.S. is made in China.
    Retailers that say they plan to increase prices

    Fruit and vegetables are seen at a Walmart supermarket in Houston, Texas, on May 15, 2025.
    Ronaldo Schemidt | Afp | Getty Images

    Walmart
    Walmart shoppers will likely see price increases toward the end of May and more in June because of tariffs, said Chief Financial Officer John David Rainey during an interview with CNBC earlier in May. Executives did not specify during the company’s most recent earnings call how much more Walmart customers could pay, but CEO Doug McMillon said items that could be affected are toys, electronics and some grocery items, including bananas, avocados, coffee and roses.

    A shopper walks past a Nike store, as global markets brace for a hit to trade and growth caused by U.S. President Donald Trump’s decision to impose import tariffs on dozens of countries, in the King of Prussia Mall in King of Prussia, Pennsylvania, U.S., April 3, 2025. 
    Rachel Wisniewski | Reuters

    Nike
    Last week, Nike said it will raise prices on a wide range of products by June 1. Nike apparel and equipment for adults will increase between $2 and $10, a person familiar with the matter previously told CNBC, while footwear will see a hike between $5 and $10, depending on price point. The company did not say whether the decision was related to tariffs, though it makes about half its footwear in China and Vietnam, which currently face 30% and 10% duties, respectively.

    People shop at a Target store on April 02, 2025 in the Flatbush neighborhood of the Brooklyn borough in New York City. 
    Michael M. Santiago | Getty Images

    Target
    Target will increase prices on certain products to help offset tariff costs, Chief Commercial Officer Rick Gomez said during the company’s latest earnings call in May. CEO Brian Cornell added that price changes are the “very last resort” for the company as it tries to mitigate effects of the duties. He declined to provide details when asked about the company’s plan for price hikes or whether it had already raised prices.
    “We’re constantly adjusting pricing,” Cornell said. “Some are going up, some will be reduced, but that’s an ongoing effort that takes place each and every day.”
    Mattel
    Barbie parent Mattel said it will raise prices on some U.S. products “where necessary” to help offset levies. CEO Ynon Kreiz said on CNBC’s “Squawk Box” in May that the company plans to source less than 40% of its products from China by the end of the year and less than 25% from that country in the next two years.
    Macy’s
    Macy’s CEO Tony Spring said during an interview with CNBC that the retailer will hike certain prices and stop carrying other items to offset the hit from tariffs. He said the company will make “surgical” price adjustments.
    Retailers that say they are considering price hikes
    Ralph Lauren
    Executives on Ralph Lauren’s May earnings call said the company is taking “selective pricing actions and strategic discount reductions” to help manage tariff impacts. CFO Justin Picicci said that Ralph Lauren is “assessing additional pricing actions” for the fall and next spring to mitigate tariffs. This is on top of the “proactive pricing” the company had already planned for the fall in North America and Asia. Executives said no single country accounts for more than 20% of the brand’s production volumes and most countries, including China, represent a single-digit percentage.
    VF Corp
    CEO Bracken Darrell said during May earnings that VF Corp, which includes brands The North Face, Vans, Timberland and Dickies, is going to be “very strategic” about pricing in response to tariffs. CFO Paul Vogel added that the company’s plans to offset the tariff impacts include cost management, sourcing relocations and “pricing actions.” Vogel said that the company’s top four sourcing countries are Vietnam, Bangladesh, Cambodia and Indonesia, in that order, and that China accounts for less than 2% of the company’s total costs coming into the U.S.
    Companies that say they will not raise prices

    People shop for lumber from a Home Depot store in Alhambra, California on April 10, 2025. 
    Frederic J. Brown | Afp | Getty Images

    Home Depot
    Last week, Home Depot broke away from the other retailers when CFO Richard McPhail told CNBC in an interview that the company intends to “generally maintain our current pricing levels across our portfolio.” He said more than half of what the company sells comes from the U.S. Home Depot has diversified its sourcing, he said, so that by this time next year, no single country outside of the U.S. will account for more than 10% of the retailer’s purchases. More

  • 150 Shares189 Views

    in Finance

    This is why Jamie Dimon is always so gloomy on the economy

    JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon has regularly warned that the U.S. economy faces perils, but even as he sounds the alarm, his bank is doing better than ever.
    A review of 20 years of Dimon’s annual investor letters and his public statements show a distinct evolution: His warnings about economic calamities became more frequent even as his bank’s performance began lapping rivals.
    Maybe the best explanation for Dimon’s dour outlook is that, no matter how big and powerful JPMorgan is, financial companies can be fragile: The history of finance is one of the rise and fall of institutions.

    Jamie Dimon, CEO of JPMorgan Chase, testifies during the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee hearing titled Annual Oversight of Wall Street Firms, in the Hart Building on Dec. 6, 2023.
    Tom Williams | Cq-roll Call, Inc. | Getty Images

    The more Jamie Dimon worries, the better his bank seems to do.
    As JPMorgan Chase has grown larger, more profitable and increasingly more crucial to the U.S. economy in recent years, its star CEO has grown more vocal about what could go wrong — all while things keep going right for his bank.

    In the best of times and in the worst of times, Dimon’s public outlook is grim.
    Whether it’s his 2022 forecast for a “hurricane” hitting the U.S. economy, his concerns over the fraying post-World War II world order or his caution about America getting hit by a one-two punch of recession and inflation, Dimon seems to lace every earnings report, TV appearance and investor event with another dire warning.
    “His track record of leading the bank is incredible,” said Ben Mackovak, a board member of four banks and investor through his firm Strategic Value Bank Partner. “His track record of making economic-calamity predictions, not as good.”
    Over his two decades running JPMorgan, Dimon, 69, has helped build a financial institution unlike any the world has seen.
    A sprawling giant in both Main Street banking and Wall Street high finance, Dimon’s bank is, in his own words, an end-game winner when it comes to money. It has more branches, deposits and online users than any peer and is a leading credit card and small business franchise. It has a top market share in both trading and investment banking, and more than $10 trillion moves over its global payment rails daily.

    ‘Warning shot’

    A review of 20 years of Dimon’s annual investor letters and his public statements show a distinct evolution. He became CEO in 2006, and his first decade at the helm of JPMorgan was consumed by the U.S. housing bubble, the 2008 financial crisis and its long aftermath, including the acquisition of two failed rivals, Bear Stearns and Washington Mutual.
    By the time he began his second decade leading JPMorgan, however, just as the legal hangover from the mortgage crisis began to fade, Dimon began seeing new storm clouds on the horizon.
    “There will be another crisis,” he wrote in his April 2015 CEO letter, musing on potential triggers and pointing out that recent gyrations in U.S. debt were a “warning shot” for markets.
    That passage marked the start of more frequent financial warnings from Dimon, including worries of a recession — which didn’t happen until the 2020 pandemic triggered a two-month contraction — as well as concerns around market meltdowns and the ballooning U.S. deficit.
    But it also marked a decade in which JPMorgan’s performance began lapping rivals.
    After leveling out at roughly $20 billion in annual profit for a few years, the sprawling machine that Dimon oversaw began to truly hit its stride. JPMorgan generated seven record annual profits from 2015 to 2024, over twice as many as in Dimon’s first decade as CEO.

    In that time, investors began aggressively bidding up JPMorgan’s shares, buying into the idea that it was a growth company in an otherwise boring sector. JPMorgan is now the world’s most valuable publicly traded financial firm and is spending $18 billion annually on technology, including artificial intelligence, to stay that way.
    While Dimon seems perpetually worried about the economy and rising geopolitical turmoil, the U.S. keeps chugging along. That means unemployment and consumer spending has been more resilient than expected, allowing JPMorgan to churn out record profits.
    In 2022, Dimon told a roomful of professional investors to prepare for an economic storm: “Right now, it’s kind of sunny, things are doing fine, everyone thinks the Fed can handle this,” Dimon said, referring to the Federal Reserve managing the post-pandemic economy.
    “That hurricane is right out there, down the road, coming our way,” he said.
    “This may be the most dangerous time the world has seen in decades,” Dimon said the following year in an earnings release.
    But investors who listened to Dimon and made their portfolios more conservative would have missed out on the best two-year run for the S&P 500 in decades.

    ‘You look stupid’

    “It’s an interesting contradiction, no doubt,” Mackovak said about Dimon’s downbeat remarks and his bank’s performance.
    “Part of it could just be the brand-building of Jamie Dimon,” the investor said. “Or having a win-win narrative where if something goes bad, you can say, ‘Oh, I called it,’ and if doesn’t, well your bank’s still chugging along.”
    According to the former president of a top five U.S. financial institution, bankers know that it’s wiser to broadcast caution than optimism. Former Citigroup CEO Chuck Prince, for example, is best known for his ill-fated 2007 comment about the mortgage business that “as long as the music is playing, you’ve got to get up and dance.”
    “One learns that there’s a lot more downside to your reputation if you are overly optimistic and things go wrong,” said the former president, who asked to remain anonymous to discuss Dimon. “It’s damaging to your bank, and you look stupid, whereas the other way around, you just look like you’re being a very cautious, thoughtful banker.”

    Banking is ultimately a business of calculated risks, and its CEOs have to be attuned to the downside, to the possibility that they don’t get repaid on their loans, said banking analyst Mike Mayo of Wells Fargo.
    “It’s the old cliche that a good banker carries an umbrella when the sun is shining; they’re always looking around the corner, always aware of what could go wrong,” Mayo said.
    But other longtime Dimon watchers see something else.
    Dimon has an “ulterior motive” for his public comments, according to Portales Partners analyst Charles Peabody.
    “I think this rhetoric is to keep his management team focused on future risks, whether they happen or not,” Peabody said. “With a high-performing, high-growth franchise, he’s trying to prevent them from becoming complacent, so I think he’s ingrained in their culture a constant war room-type atmosphere.”
    Dimon has no shortage of things to worry about these days, despite the fact that his bank generated a record $58.5 billion in profit last year. Conflicts in Ukraine and Gaza rage on, the U.S. national debt grows, and President Donald Trump’s trade policies continue to jolt adversaries and allies alike.

    Graveyard of bank logos

    “It’s fair to observe that he’s not omniscient and not everything he says comes true,” said Truist bank analyst Brian Foran. “He comes at it more from a perspective that you need to be prepared for X, as opposed to we’re convinced X is going to happen.”
    JPMorgan was better positioned for higher interest rates than most of its peers were in 2023, when rates surged and punished those who held low-yielding long-term bonds, Foran noted.
    “For many years, he said, ‘Be prepared for the 10-year at 5%, and we all thought he was crazy, because it was like 1% at the time,” Foran said. “Turns out that being prepared was not a bad thing.”
    Perhaps the best explanation for Dimon’s dour outlook is that, no matter how big and powerful JPMorgan is, financial companies can be fragile. The history of finance is one of the rise and fall of institutions, sometimes when managers become complacent or greedy.
    In fact, the graveyard of bank logos that are no longer used includes three — Bear Stearns, Washington Mutual and First Republic — that have been subsumed by JPMorgan.
    During his bank’s investor day meeting this month, Dimon pointed out that, in the past decade, JPMorgan has been one of the only firms to earn annual returns of more than 17%.
    “If you go back to the 10 years before that, OK, a lot of people earned over 17%,” Dimon said. “Almost every single one went bankrupt. Hear what I just said?”
    “Almost every single major financial company in the world almost didn’t make it,” he said. “It’s a rough world out there.” More