Trending
The Truth Social post seems quite straightforward — the August 1st date for tariff implementation is a firm deadline — but stocks barely budged after the President posted that at 10:45 EDT. The blasé attitude once again stems from traders’ perception that tariff discussions remain flexible. Considering that just last night the President told reporters that the current deadline is “firm but not 100% firm,” can you blame them? Heck, a lot of money has been made by traders betting on tariff malleability – why should they reverse course now?
Source: Truth Social
Yesterday, as the market was bouncing off its lows, I was asked whether investors still care about tariffs. I responded:
As long as the market can plausibly assert that there is room for negotiation or extension, then it won’t freak out (cue theme song ‘Won’t Get Fooled Again’)”
When asked how investors can continue to ignore tariff headwinds, I offered:
Because they were burnt when they reacted to the first batch [of tariffs] and saw how firmly the market responded to the reprieve. Thus the takeaway was don’t react (or react at all?) to bad news because they’ll just become buying opportunities anyway.
Thanks to the relentless dip buying, the “half-life” of dips has been drastically shrinking.
With some hindsight, the last line seems the most significant here. There is an increasing attitude, if not a near-certainty, that every dip will soon become a buying opportunity. And if taken to its logical conclusion, if every dip will indeed be recouped shortly, then why sell at all? That seems to be the attitude around tariffs, and increasingly for a wide range of stocks as well.
We wrote yesterday about how “Tesla Vigilantes”, investors who are unhappy with Elon Musk’s forays into politics, were the likely culprits responsible for pushing the stock down by about -7%. Today we see the stock recovering about 1/3 of yesterday’s drop, and importantly, spending most of today’s session above yesterday’s highs. Those who bought the dip and held overnight are generally doing well today. Buy-the-dip worked again for many.
Can this work forever, for every stock, all the time? Of course not. But since it is working for many traders in a wide range of stocks quite often, it’s understandable why this is becoming an increasingly popular mindset. And when it comes to tariffs, it’s worked best to ignore the day-to-day noise. Will that work endlessly? Seemingly not. But as long as there is a reasonable probability for tariffs to be delayed, renegotiated, or otherwise not implemented, then traders are happy to “take the over” since it’s worked quite well to do that for weeks.
Related: Why Markets Seem Unbothered Ahead of the Jobs Report