Finance

The Trump administration has been extraordinarily blasé about falling stocks. “I can tell you that corrections are healthy, they are normal,” said Scott Bessent, America’s treasury secretary on March 16th, in the government’s most recent shrug. The stumble in America’s long stockmarket rally—the S&P 500 index is down by 8% from its all-time high in February—may have been prompted by Donald Trump’s enthusiasm for tariffs, but it has been exacerbated by the perception that the new administration is quite relaxed about the dip, and therefore likely to continue pursuing damaging policies. More

“We’ve got a lot of AI to build. AI is the foundation, the operating system of every industry going forward. … We are enthusiastic about building in America,” Huang said.
“Partners are working with us to bring manufacturing here. In the near term, the impact of tariffs won’t be meaningful,” he added.

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang downplayed the negative impact from President Donald Trump’s tariffs, saying there won’t be any significant damage in the short run.
“We’ve got a lot of AI to build … AI is the foundation, the operating system of every industry going forward. … We are enthusiastic about building in America,” Huang said Wednesday in a CNBC “Squawk on the Street” interview. “Partners are working with us to bring manufacturing here. In the near term, the impact of tariffs won’t be meaningful.”

Trump has launched a new trade war by imposing tariffs against Washington’s three biggest trading partners, drawing immediate responses from Mexico, Canada and China. Recently, Trump said he would not change his mind about enacting sweeping “reciprocal tariffs” on other countries that put up trade barriers to U.S. goods. The White House said those tariffs are set to take effect April 2.
“We’re as enthusiastic about building in America as anybody,” Huang said. “We’ve been working with TSMC to get them ready for manufacturing chips here in the United States. We also have great partners like Foxconn and Wistron, who are working with us to bring manufacturing onshore, so long-term manufacturing onshore is going to be something very, very possible to do, and we’ll do it.”
Shares of Nvidia have fallen more than 20% from their record high reached in January. The stock suffered a massive sell-off earlier this year due to concerns sparked by Chinese artificial intelligence lab DeepSeek that companies could potentially get greater performance in AI on far-lower infrastructure costs. Huang has pushed back on that theory, saying DeepSeek popularized reasoning models that will need more chips.
Nvidia, which designs and manufactures graphics processing units that are essential to the AI boom, has been restricted from doing business in China due to export controls that were increased at the end of the Biden administration.
Huang previously said the company’s percentage of revenue in China has fallen by about half due to the export restrictions, adding that there are other competitive pressures in the country, including from Huawei.

Don’t miss these insights from CNBC PRO More

Investor uncertainty have led to volatile trading in the stock market.
They are unnerved by see-sawing Trump administration policy positions, most importantly on tariffs, experts said.
Investors don’t know how policy will impact corporate profits, experts said.

Traders on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange on March 14, 2025, at the opening bell. 
Timothy A. Clary | Afp | Getty Images

Uncertainty isn’t in short supply these days — and investors have taken notice.
See-sawing policy from the White House has given investors whiplash on many fronts — with tariffs being among the biggest question marks, market experts say.

Coupled with uncertainty around federal job cuts, negotiations to end the war in Ukraine and other issues, the combination has been “disorienting to market sentiment,” Paul Christopher, head of global investment strategy at the Wells Fargo Investment Institute, wrote Wednesday.
Stocks have wobbled amid the vertigo.
The S&P 500 entered a correction last week, meaning the U.S. stock index fell 10% from its recent high mark in February. The index has recovered a bit but teetered on the edge of a correction Tuesday afternoon.
The benchmark is down about 5% in 2025.

Uncertainty makes investors jittery — and stock markets volatile — because they don’t know how policy and other events will impact companies’ ability to make money, said Barry Glassman, a certified financial planner and founder of Glassman Wealth Services.

Worried consumers might pull back on spending, crimping profits, for example. Tariffs raise costs for certain companies to import or produce goods — and it’s unclear how other nations might retaliate. While economists generally don’t think federal trade policy and job cuts will push the U.S. into recession, Trump hasn’t ruled out that possibility.
“All of this comes down to corporate profits,” said Glassman, a member of CNBC’s Advisor Council. “People will put more dollars where they have greater confidence in the investments,” he added.

Many ‘unanswered’ questions

There’s always uncertainty in the stock market, but it may feel more acute right now than at other times, experts said.
A recent (and perhaps counterintuitive) example of that uncertainty came on March 6, when President Donald Trump reversed course and delayed 25% tariffs on many imports from Canada and Mexico by a month. That delay came two days after the tariffs had taken effect.
Despite that “reprieve,” the S&P 500 sold off sharply during the day’s trading session, BeiChen Lin, senior investment strategist at Russell Investments, said recently.
More from Personal Finance:Wholesale egg prices have ‘plunged’How to manage your student loan payments after a layoffHarvard announces free tuition for families making under $200K annually
“There are still a lot of questions that remain unanswered,” Lin said.
For example, Lin said, what would happen after the 30-day delay? How might Mexico and Canada respond? Will the U.S. impose tariffs on other countries or products?
National Economic Council director Kevin Hassett warned Monday of “some uncertainty” over Trump’s tariff policy in coming weeks. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said last week that the Trump administration is more focused on long-term health of the U.S. economy instead of short-term volatility.

‘It’s all based on emotion’

Brad Klontz, a certified financial planner and behavioral finance expert, said he thinks the stock market turmoil ties into something more primitive than corporate profits: Human psychology.
“Quite frankly, it’s all based on emotion,” said Klontz, managing principal of YMW Advisors in Boulder, Colorado, and a member of CNBC’s Advisor Council.
“We like to feel like we can predict the future. When we feel the future is unpredictable, when we don’t have faith in our leaders, that’s when we start to panic,” Klontz said.
“There’s a ton of fear” right now, he added.

Amid fear, it’s important for investors to put the recent market moves into perspective, advisors said.
A 10% pullback isn’t shocking after two consecutive years of annual stock returns exceeding 20%, Glassman said.
“This is normal,” Glassman said of the market’s temper tantrums.
However, investors often make bad financial choices by engaging in catastrophic thinking (believing the markets may never recover, for example), Klontz said. They buy high and sell low, he said.
Historically, the market has always bounced back higher.
“If you lost $40,000, you have to ask yourself, did you really lose it?” Klontz said. “If you didn’t sell, I’m not sure you lost it. If you sold, you guaranteed lost that $40,000.”

Focus on what you can control

During times of uncertainty, investors should focus on what they can control, Klontz said.
It’s a good time for investors to look at their asset allocation, and ensure their overall stock-bond holdings haven’t gotten too risky or conservative over time, for example, Klontz said.

The recent volatility has also shown the value of diversification among different asset classes in an investment portfolio, Glassman said.
For example, international stocks in both developed and emerging markets are up this year, even though U.S. stocks are down, Glassman said. Bond returns have also been positive, he said.
Ultimately, investor behavior is the biggest threat to stock returns, not the federal government, Klontz said. More

The British unit of Spanish lender Santander on Wednesday said 750 of its staff were at risk of redundancy as it targets 95 branch closures in the U.K.
Questions have risen over the future of Santander’s international footprint, amid reports earlier in the year that the lender could be considering an exit from Britain.
“The UK is a core market for Santander and this has not changed,” a Santander spokesperson told CNBC on Wednesday.

Jonathan Nicholson | NurPhoto | Getty Images

The British unit of Spanish lender Banco Santander on Wednesday said 750 of its staff were at risk of redundancy as it targets 95 branch closures in the U.K.
The decision is part of the bank’s broader plans to update its presence from June 2025 and will bring Santander UK’s network to 349 branches, including 290 that are full-service, 36 operating with reduced hours and 18 that are counter-free and five Work Cafes.

“Closing a branch is always a very difficult decision and we spend a great deal of time assessing where and when we do this and how to minimise the impact it may have on our customers,” a Santander UK spokesperson said.
The bank further noted a “a rapid movement of customers choosing to do their banking digitally,” flagging it has observed a 63% boost in digital transactions versus a 61% decline in dealings done at physical branches since 2019.
Santander said it was consulting unions over the proposed changes. The bank employs around 18,000 full-time staff in the U.K., according to the annual report of the British unit.
Questions have risen over the future of Santander’s international footprint, just two decades since its acquisition of Abbey National brought it to the front of Britain’s high street. At the start of the year, the Financial Times reported that the lender could be considering an exit from its U.K. operations, which Santander Executive Chair Ana Botin has since repeatedly refuted.
“The UK is a core market for Santander and this has not changed,” a Santander spokesperson told CNBC on Wednesday.

In October, Reuters reported Santander CEO Hector Grisi forecast the lender would trim more than 1,400 jobs from its British business by the time it finalizes a cost-cutting drive, without specifying a timeline.
The lender has faced some tumult in Britain, setting aside £295 million ($382.7 million) in November to cover possible payouts linked to a broader industry probe into motor finance commissions.
Back in February, Spain’s largest lender reported record fourth-quarter profit up 11% year on year to 3.265 billion euros ($3.56 billion), further announcing plans for 10 billion euros ($10.89 billion) in share buybacks from 2025 and 2026 earnings and anticipated excess capital. More

Among the top five priorities China has laid out for boosting consumption is child care subsidies.
A national-level policy of 100 billion yuan ($13.84 billion) for child care subsidies could come soon this year, Jianguang Shen, chief economist at Chinese e-commerce company JD.com, said in Mandarin, translated by CNBC.
In a glimpse of what is already being rolled out, the Inner Mongolian capital of Hohhot, last week announced subsidies of up to 100,000 yuan for children of registered locals who live and work in the city.

Customers browse children’s clothing at a wholesale store in Chongqing, China, on March 1, 2025.
Cheng Xin | Getty Images News | Getty Images

BEIJING — Among the top five priorities China has laid out for boosting consumption is child care subsidies.
It’s an effort to tackle the country’s rapid drop in births, while freeing up cash for discretionary spending.

As with many Chinese policies, the plan released Sunday only lays out a framework: “Strengthen support for childbirth and raising children. Research and establish a system for subsidizing child care.” That’s according to a CNBC translation of the Chinese.
Beijing is moving relatively quickly, however.
The National Health Commission is already drafting an operational plan for subsidizing child care, Li Chunlin, deputy director of the economic planner, the National Development and Reform Commission, told reporters Monday.

A national-level policy of 100 billion yuan ($13.84 billion) for child care subsidies could come soon this year, Jianguang Shen, chief economist at Chinese e-commerce company JD.com, said in Mandarin, translated by CNBC.
That’s based on his estimate of around 9 million births this year, and monthly handouts of around 800 yuan to parents, regardless of income, Shen said. He noted half of the cash could come in the form of vouchers for baby products to prevent households from saving the money.

China recorded 9.54 million births last year, up by 520,000 from the prior year, as many locals considered 2024 an auspicious year for births based on the Chinese zodiac’s year of the Dragon. However, World Bank data showed that the fertility rate, defined as births per woman, was 1.2 in China in 2022, down from 1.8 in 2012.
“The key is to increase fiscal resources,” Shen said, noting that in the context of 300 billion yuan for trade-in subsidies, 100 billion yuan for child care isn’t too much to ask for. He forecasts around 3.5% to 4.5% growth in retail sales this year.
China’s retail sales grew by a modest 3.5% last year, according to official data. The January to February period, which covers the annul Lunar New Year holiday, saw a modest pick up to 4% year on year, the statistics bureau said Monday.

How much is enough?

In a glimpse of what is already being rolled out, the Inner Mongolian capital of Hohhot, last week announced subsidies of up to 100,000 yuan for children of registered locals who live and work in the city.
The couple can enjoy a one-time subsidy of 10,000 yuan upon the birth of their first child. Their second child is eligible for 10,000 yuan in annual subsidies until the age of five. If the couple have a third child, the city will provide 10,000 yuan each year until the child turns 10.
The tech hub of Shenzhen this month said it is considering a smaller-scale subsidy. State media noted that National Health Commission data as of October showed several local governments in more than 20 provinces were already offering some kind of child care subsidy.
“If the childcare subsidy in Hohhot can be extended to the whole country, it could amount to another 0.2% of retail sales in the initial year,” Citi analysts said in a report Tuesday. They said the subsidy could be most meaningful for low-income families and “could become more significant if the central government steps in to share the burden.”
“It remains to be seen if it will be effective in boosting fertility rate in the longer term,” the Citi analysts said, noting the total cost of raising a child in China is reportedly around 538,000 yuan, not to mention the opportunity cost for working mothers.
The per capita disposable income of rural residents was 23,119 yuan in 2024, while that of urban residents was more than two times higher at 54,188 yuan, according to official figures.
Short-term subsidies for child care could still significantly ease financial pressure on Chinese households.
When Beijing resident Song Jingli, now 41, gave birth to her daughter nearly 10 years ago, there was no child care support. Song said she made 8,000 yuan a month at the time, and day care cost 4,000 yuan.
“We didn’t have a choice,” she said. My husband “needed to go to work, I needed to go to work, and my parents-in-law were not able to take care of her.”
By the time her daughter was in kindergarten, Song said, she was able to benefit from a relatively new policy that halved the cost to around 2,000 yuan. The new policies on child care are “right to the point,” she said. “The only pity [is] it’s too late for us who were born in the 1980s. Hopefully younger generations can benefit from these policies.”

What to watch next

China’s efforts to boost consumption also include calls for increasing the minimum wage, stabilizing the stock market, boosting farmers’ income and resolving payment delays for businesses.
“The direction of [China’s] consumption-boosting measures is correct,” Goldman Sachs analysts said in a report Monday, “but both funding and implementation matter for the effectiveness of China’s consumption stimulus.”
“The announcement of a nationwide childcare subsidy and the April Politburo meeting are key to watch in coming months,” the analysts said, referring to a high-level policy meeting typically held in late April. More

Spencer Platt | Getty Images

Individual investors, whose assets are more tied to the stock market than ever, have abandoned their tried-and-true dip-buying mentality as the S&P 500 recently fell into a painful, 10% correction.
Retail outflows from U.S. equities rose to about $4 billion over the past two weeks as tariff chaos and mounting economic concerns caused a three-week pullback in the S&P 500, according to data from Barclays. During March’s sell-off, 401(k) holders have been aggressively trading their investments, to the tune of four times the average level, according to Alight Solutions’ data going back to the late 1990s.

“If people were trying to buy the dip and get their stocks on sale, maybe you would see people actually buying large-cap equities. But instead we see people selling from large cap-equities,” said Rob Austin, director of research at Alight Solutions. “So this does appear to be a bit of a reactionary trading activity.”

Arrows pointing outwards

The increased selling came as American households are more sensitive than ever to the turbulence in the stock market. U.S. household ownership of equities has reached a record level, amounting to nearly half their financial assets, according to Federal Reserve data.
Dip-buying had served investors well over the past two years as Main Street rode the artificial intelligence-inspired bull market to record highs. At one point, the S&P 500 went more than 370 days without even a 2.1% sell-off, the longest such stretch since the global financial crisis of 2008-09.
But lately, markets began to sour as President Donald Trump’s aggressive tariffs and sudden changes in policy stirred up volatility, stoking fears of dampened consumer spending, slower economic growth, weaker profits and maybe even a recession. The S&P 500 officially entered a correction late last week, and is now sitting some 8.7% below its February all-time high.

Stock chart icon

Still, retail traders are far from throwing in the towel. For example, the net debit of margin accounts, a “popular proxy for retail investors’ sentiment,” continues to stay elevated, according to Barclays data.

“There is plenty of room for retail investors to further disengage from the equity market,” analysts led by Venu Krishna, Barclays head of U.S. equity strategy, said in a note Tuesday to clients. “We are of the view that retail investors have in no way capitulated.”
Barclays’ proprietary euphoria indicator shows sentiment has been brought down to levels similar to where it was around the time of the U.S. presidential election in November, but is still high by historic standards.
“It’s not like everybody is going out there saying the sky is falling. Most people, it looks like, are not making any sort of reactions,” Austin said. More

Think of America as a vast economic experiment. The country left the covid-19 pandemic full of stimulus, and with a roaring stockmarket. Which places managed to channel this vigour into new companies, houses, power stations and intellectual property? And which let rents and prices surge instead? More

Wall Street analysts endorsed Capital One , and the Club stock bounced Tuesday — one day after a sharp slide on concerns about possible regulatory hurdles to the company’s pending Discover acquisition. The news Citi, KBW, and Jefferies all said they still expect the $35 billion deal to be completed despite a Monday afternoon report from The Capital Forum subscription service, which indicated the Justice Department may challenge it on anticompetitive grounds concerning subprime credit card concentration of the combined company. Shares of Capital One and Discover closed down nearly 4% and 7%, respectively, on Monday. KBW maintained its buy-equivalent rating on Capital One, calling Monday’s market reaction to the report “overblown.” Citi said that if the DOJ is concerned then Capital One will likely find a way to appease regulators. “Our view remains that if the DOJ finds issue with this subprime concentration, COF will work with regulators to find a compromise which could include selling part of the Discover card portfolio but retaining the network, which is the crown jewel of the deal,” the analysts said. Jefferies also speculated on a possible sale of Discover’s subprime portfolio, forecasting a “modest impact to pro forma EPS.” But the analysts said they “still see the deal as very accretive.” A spokesperson for Capital One told CNBC in a statement that the merger meets all legal requirements and remains “well-positioned to gain approval” COF YTD mountain Capital One Financial (COF) year-to-date performance Big picture The news comes amid a legal battle between Capital One and the family business of President Donald Trump . Earlier this month, the Trump Organization filed a lawsuit alleging Capital One violated consumer protection laws by closing the company’s accounts following the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol. For its part, Capital One has said it does not close customer accounts for political reasons. To be sure, the regulatory consideration of the Discover purchase will be a major test of post-election expectations that a Trump administration would favor more mergers and acquisitions than former President Joe Biden ‘s. Bottom line Against this complex backdrop, we agree with Wall Street’s optimism about the Capital One-Discover deal eventually getting approval. Like the analysts, we’re not ruling out remedies if required by regulators. That’s because it doesn’t seem like Capital One CEO Richard Fairbank would let a divestiture of the combined company’s subprime portfolio stand in the way of the deal. “Owning a payment network, that’s the holy grail” for Capital One, said Jeff Marks, director of portfolio analysis for the Investing Club. “That’s what they want most, not necessarily being this huge subprime owner.” The Discover acquisition is a big reason why we initiated a position in Capital One in the first place on March 6 and subsequently made five more small additions since then, including a buy on Friday . If completed, Capital One will own the Discover Global Network, which will decrease the firm’s reliance on industry heavyweights Mastercard and Visa — and, in turn, lower what it pays out in fees. “I think our thesis hinges on this deal being approved,” Marks added. “We certainly thought under a Trump regime, it would be more likely to be approved. That’s why we started to buy the stock down at these lower levels.” (Jim Cramer’s Charitable Trust is long COF. See here for a full list of the stocks.) As a subscriber to the CNBC Investing Club with Jim Cramer, you will receive a trade alert before Jim makes a trade. Jim waits 45 minutes after sending a trade alert before buying or selling a stock in his charitable trust’s portfolio. If Jim has talked about a stock on CNBC TV, he waits 72 hours after issuing the trade alert before executing the trade. THE ABOVE INVESTING CLUB INFORMATION IS SUBJECT TO OUR TERMS AND CONDITIONS AND PRIVACY POLICY , TOGETHER WITH OUR DISCLAIMER . NO FIDUCIARY OBLIGATION OR DUTY EXISTS, OR IS CREATED, BY VIRTUE OF YOUR RECEIPT OF ANY INFORMATION PROVIDED IN CONNECTION WITH THE INVESTING CLUB. NO SPECIFIC OUTCOME OR PROFIT IS GUARANTEED.

Screens display the logos and trading information for Capital One Financial and Discover Financial as traders work on the floor at the New York Stock Exchange on Feb. 20, 2024.
Brendan Mcdermid | Reuters More