Buyers' Remorse setting in quickly from CEOs - Wall Street Journal

[torbee]

For CEOs and Bankers, the Trump Euphoria Is Fading Fast​

Deals market gets curtailed by uncertainty delivered in president’s first weeks​

By
Lauren Thomas

Feb. 9, 2025

It took less than a month for the second Trump administration to cool the enthusiasm of chief executives and dealmakers.

Consumer sentiment is down and inflation expectations are rising, driven in part by worries about the impact of a threatened trade war. The deals market just ended its quietest January in a decade. A Justice Department that was expected to wave through acquisitions instead sued to block a big technology merger.
Corporate bigwigs are now using phrases like “fragility,” “volatility” and “wait and see” to describe their outlooks.

“Nobody knows what’s up,” Nick Pinchuk, chief executive of toolmaker Snap-on, said on a conference call Thursday. “It’s like being on Space Mountain at Disney World. You get on Space Mountain, you get in a car, and you’re in the dark and the cars go left and right, left and right and abrupt turns, you don’t know where you’re going, but you know, you’re pretty confident that you’re going to get to the right place at the bottom.”

The recent whipsaw on tariffs seemed to hit hardest on business leaders’ confidence. President Trump announced plans to stick 25% tariffs on imports from Canada and Mexico, only to delay them for a month a few days later. A number of executives, as well as top investment bankers and other industry advisers, have said that priorities have shifted in recent days to navigating tariffs and other policy issues.

They need to settle supply routes, discuss whether to raise their own prices and figure out what is even happening. That doesn’t leave much room for thinking about big bet-the-company deals.

The reaction is evident in the deals market. Just under 900 deals were announced in the U.S. in January, according to data from LSEG. That compares with more than 1,200 transactions in the previous January and over 1,500 two years ago.

Even the hope of a lighter regulatory touch has taken a knock. The Justice Department sued to block Hewlett Packard Enterprise’s $14 billion deal to buy Juniper Networks. The companies, which make wireless networking products for large corporate customers, plan to defend the deal.

Not all of the deal trouble can be blamed on the macroenvironment. Buyers and sellers have to find agreement on many details, and those talks can falter for many reasons. A deal to combine Japanese automakers Nissan and Honda appears on the brink of collapse, and Bausch Health said its efforts to unload its Bausch + Lomb eye-care subsidiary to a private-equity suitor have sputtered.

There are still some CEOs eager to do deals, even if their counterparts are wary. There were six hostile or unsolicited deals announced in January, a level not seen in a month since May 2018, according to LSEG data.

Cintas, a maker of workplace products, made a $5.1 billion offer for smaller uniform supplier UniFirst that has been rebuffed several times. Building-products distributor QXO has launched a hostile bid for Beacon Roofing Supply, which in turn launched a poison pill to try to stop QXO.

Executives and Wall Street still remain optimistic about the full year and predict more deals than in recent years.

“The much anticipated M&A tsunami of 2025 has yet to make landfall, but the conditions are all still ripe for that to arrive later this year,” said Jim Langston, an M&A partner at the law firm Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison.

Langston said that while the past month or so has been more unpredictable, historically M&A activity doesn’t increase after a U.S. presidential inauguration until the start of the second quarter.

He and others say private-equity clients also expect to be more active later this year, for instance. Private-equity firm Sycamore is still trying to pull off a takeover of Walgreens Boots Alliance, as The Wall Street Journal reported, according to people familiar with the matter.

But to get those deals done, CEOs will need to find more comfort than they have today. A day after the election, David Galullo, CEO of the San Francisco design firm Rapt Studio, told his employees that he knew they were likely experiencing a whirl of emotions. Though he didn’t vote for Trump, he was trying to stay optimistic about the president’s early days for the economy.

The first two weeks, though, left Galullo concerned. He is planning to address his team again, but is at a loss for words because so much is happening so quickly.

“I don’t know what to say,” he said.

 

[BlIIlken2]

 

[drew_hawk]

 

[Bonerfarts]

Hearing lots of rumblings about tariffs from work guys who are big Republicans. Definitely effecting supply prices.

 

[St. Louis Hawk]

 

[hawkeyetraveler]

I have the ever-so smallest hint of empathy for low IQ folks who took a powerful man at his word that tariffs would be paid for by the country exporting the goods. We have a number of posters on here that fit that profile. It’s not their fault they are stupid after all.

But the big time corporate republicans who embraced Trump 2.0 should have known better. The volatile back and forth policy making, the asinine tariffs, the dumbass stream-of-consciousness statements…these were all obvious to people with any level of intelligence and training in business/economics.

I am just surprised that these old school type republicans forgot the chaotic nature of Trump’s first term. And that was with handlers that weren’t all in on MAGA craziness.

Hopefully the negative impacts happen fast so we can recover from his disastrous economic policies equally fast and get back to market stability,

 

[Chishawk1425]

 

[Here_4_a_Day]

View embedded media

Come on Chissy ShellShock, that's bly sky lies! 🤣 🤡

 

[Crafty Beaver]

The article doesn't seem to match the headline.

Except for maybe the CEO from the San Francisco company, who didn't vote for Trump in the first place trying to contain the "whirl of emotions".

 

[Whiskeydeltadeltatango]

I went back and forth about posting about it but foe the first time that I can remember I have a Facebook fight between two people I used to work with. Both market level guys.

I would compare it to "aardvark" and "traveler" debating something, two very intelligent men.



Long story short, look into the consumer confidence and inflation expectations numbers. Republicans and Independents have maintained or improved where as dems have fallen the hell off.


If dems being doom and gloom right now suprises you enjoy a bowl and read the page for a couple hours.

 

[HawkinK.C.1]

teo very i telligent men.

Can I trust your judgement here?

 

[RileyHawk]

I went back and forth about posting about it but foe the first time that I can remember I have a Facebook fight between two people I used to work with. Both market level guys.

I would compare it to "aardvark" and "traveler" debating something, two very intelligent men.



Long story short, look into the consumer confidence and inflation expectations numbers. Republicans and Independents have maintained or improved where as dems have fallen the hell off.


If dems being doom and gloom right now suprises you enjoy a bowl and read the page for a couple hours.

By income group, the sharpest decline in confidence was seen in households earning over $125K, while consumers at the bottom of the income range reported the strongest gains. The confidence gap between the top income groups and those making between $75K and $100K narrowed.

Your assessment makes sense based on the outlook of low income republicans.

 

[Bonerfarts]

I went back and forth about posting about it but foe the first time that I can remember I have a Facebook fight between two people I used to work with. Both market level guys.

I would compare it to "aardvark" and "traveler" debating something, two very intelligent men.



Long story short, look into the consumer confidence and inflation expectations numbers. Republicans and Independents have maintained or improved where as dems have fallen the hell off.


If dems being doom and gloom right now suprises you enjoy a bowl and read the page for a couple hours.

I think there is time for Trump to pull back from this trade war policy. If he uses it a negotiating tool, then more power to him. If he imposes tariffs on the US's biggest trade partners (friend or foe), I feel this will greatly weaken our economy and cause extreme inflation. Focused tariffs on China and Russia make sense to me, broad tariffs on Canada and Mexico is truly idiotic.

 

[Tenacious E]

Can I trust your judgement here?

Can I trust your judgment?

 

[Whiskeydeltadeltatango]

Can I trust your judgement here?

I've been up and going since 415. I don't even remember what airport I was in when I responded with that.

* time stamp would say Denver


*And I think I may have left my truck door open at DSM, and I have 58 minutes to get to the resort, get checked in, get to the course and tee off.



But good news, my travels have taken me from 11 degrees to 80.

 

[torbee]

But wait, there's more!

Farmers on the hook for millions after Trump freezes USDA funds​

The White House had repeatedly said the funding freeze would not affect benefits that go directly to individuals.

February 10, 2025

By Daniel Wu
Gaya Gupta
and
Anumita Kaur

Farmers report missing millions of dollars of funding they were promised by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, despite promises from the Trump administration that a federal funding freeze would not apply to projects directly benefiting individuals.

On his first day in office, President Donald Trump ordered the USDA to freeze funds for several programs designated by President Joe Biden’s signature clean-energy and health-care law, the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act. The freeze paused some funding for the department’s Environmental Quality Incentives Program, which helps farmers address natural resource concerns, and the Rural Energy for America Program, which provides financial assistance for farmers to improve their infrastructure.

Farmers who signed contracts with the USDA under those programs paid up front to build fencing, plant new crops and install renewable energy systems with guarantees that the federal government would issue grants and loan guarantees to cover at least part of their costs. Now, with that money frozen, they’re on the hook.

Laura Beth Resnick, who runs a Maryland flower farm, said she signed a contract for the USDA to cover half of a $72,900 solar panel installation. In late January, she said, she was told her reimbursement payment was rejected because of Trump’s executive order.

“I really don’t know what we would do,” Resnick said. “It just feels like I can’t even really think about it.”

The USDA has also halted funding for other programs, including scientific research grants in agriculture and producing climate-smart crops, according to a letter sent to the agency Thursday from House Democrats on the Agriculture and Appropriations committees.

“Pulling the rug out from these recipients runs counter to the mission of the USDA and will quickly and significantly cripple economic development in rural America,” the letter says.


The White House repeatedly said the freeze of agriculture funding and other federal financial assistance would not affect benefits that go directly to individuals, such as farmers. The administration rescinded the pause after a federal judge temporarily halted its implementation.

But over the weekend, farmers reported that their funding remained frozen — another blow to farmers who are also facing threats of tariffs and freezes to foreign-aid spending that involved food purchased from American producers.

In a statement, a USDA spokesperson said the Trump administration “rightfully has asked for a comprehensive review of all contracts, work, and personnel across all federal agencies.”

“Anything that violates the President’s Executive Orders will be subject for review,” the statement said. “The Department of Agriculture will be happy to provide a response to interested parties once Brooke Rollins is confirmed [as secretary of agriculture] and has the opportunity to analyze these reviews.”

The White House did not respond to a request for comment.

The disruption to funds appropriated through the Inflation Reduction Act takes aim at one of Biden’s flagship legislative accomplishments. Most of that funding was doled out in the last month of his presidency, according to a Washington Post analysis. But grants worth $32 billion authorized under the act remain vulnerable to being frozen.

The USDA made $3.1 billion from the Inflation Reduction Act available in the 2024 fiscal year for climate-smart agriculture activities, according to the department, including grants and loans for initiatives such as the Environmental Quality Incentives Program and the Rural Energy for America Program.

On Wednesday, National Farmers Union President Rob Larew testified before the Senate Agriculture Committee that the Trump administration’s sweeping decisions on federal funding were creating concern for farmers across the country.

“No one knows what funding will be available or if key programs will have the staff needed to operate,” Larew said. “Freezing spending and making sweeping decisions without congressional oversight just adds more uncertainty to an already tough farm economy.”

Skylar Holden, a cattle farmer in eastern Missouri, said he signed a $240,000 contract in December under the Environmental Quality Incentives Program to share costs on investments for his farm.
With the funding, Holden erected new fencing and installed a well. He had planned further improvements to his farm’s water system and spent $80,000 on materials and labor contracts that he expected would be partly paid back by the government.

This month, a USDA representative told him the funding was paused because of Trump’s executive order.
“I asked her, ‘Is there any word on when they’re going to be unfrozen?’” Holden said. “‘Is it going to be frozen indefinitely?’ She didn’t have any answers for me.”

The department suggested that Holden’s only recourse was to contact his congressional representatives, he said.

With the money promised in his contract on hold, Holden said he’s in a bind. Up-front payments for the construction and materials he arranged for are due soon, on top of his regular operating expenses. The terms of his contract also stipulate that he must pay back the money he has already received from the department, plus interest, if he does not complete all the development outlined in the contract within five years. If the freeze continues, he said, he will have to take out additional loans or sell his farm equipment and cattle.

“If I sell them out to make this payment, I’m hurting myself years down the line,” Holden said. “I’m robbing myself of the future.”

Resnick, the flower farmer in Maryland, received a grant from the Rural Energy for America Program last year, she said. The initiative provides loan financing and grant funding to agricultural producers and rural small businesses to make energy efficiency improvements.

The grant was slated for solar panel installation on Resnick’s farm — an improvement she said would save her farm $5,000 a year and be better for the environment. Now, with the contract seemingly suspended, Resnick doesn’t know what to do.

“We don’t have a whole lot of capital to hire a lawyer,” she said.

The funding freezes have also paused large projects across states. The Iowa Soybean Association said Thursday that USDA payments had been suspended for a five-year Midwest Climate Smart Commodity grant that the organization secured in 2022. The $95 million deal supports more than 1,000 farms in 12 Midwestern states and encourages conservation practices in producing corn, soybeans, wheat and sugar beets, the association said.

Hundreds of participating farmers are owed $11 million after investing in new farming practices and crops because of the program, the association said.

Resnick said she’s at a loss for what to do next with the government’s promised payment of around $36,000 on hold. She is already paying back a loan she took out to launch her farm. Taking out another one would be unimaginable.

“It scares me for the future of farming,” Resnick said. “Not just that funding won’t be available for new farmers that need it, but that farmers won’t trust the government going forward.”

 

[Obviously Oblivious]

I wish these titans of industry had warned all of us before the election that Trump would have a profound negative impact on our business economy.

Oh wait, never mind, they did warn us. Unfortunately our electorate isn’t paying attention to the important stuff.

 

[torbee]

But wait, there's even EVEN more! What a wonderful impact this is having on just about everything!

Trump has unleashed chaos by distraction upon the international community​

By LAURIE KELLMAN, Associated Press
Updated 11:37 AM CST, February 10, 2025

LONDON (AP) — The Saudis are furious. The Danes are scrambling. Colombia has backed down. Mexico and Canada stand in a purgatory between tariff wars with the US and … not. China has retaliated, launching a trade war between the economic superpowers. The Brits, long proud of their “special relationship” with the United States, are leaning into their tradition of quiet diplomacy.

It’s as if President Donald Trump has flung a bag of marbles across the global stage, under the feet of foreign leaders who have often stepped together through eight decades of postwar global order.

Everyone, it seems, is responding to Trump — even Australia’s leader, when asked last week for his thoughts only a few hours after Trump announced the US would “take over” the decimated Gaza Strip and turn it into the “Riviera of the Middle East.”

“I’m not going to, as Australia’s prime minister, give a daily commentary on statements by the U.S. president,” Anthony Albanese told reporters.

Acknowledged publicly or not, world leaders are watching Trump’s wood-chipper approach to some American government institutions and wondering about those of the post-Cold War order: What of the U.S. roles in NATO, the United Nations, the World Bank and other pillars of the international order? On U.S.-controlled NATO, Trump has long questioned the value of the pact and threatened not to defend members of the alliance that fail to meet defense-spending goals. On his first day back in the Oval Office, Trump began to pull the United States out of the World Health Organization for the second time, an act that would leave the U.N. agency without its biggest donor. WHO’s leaders huddled over a response and asked diplomats to lean on Washington to reverse Trump’s decision. A German envoy worried: “The roof is on fire.”

“Trump’s actions portend a permanent shift in the landscape — not just a switch that flips back in four years’ time,” wrote Heather Hurlburt, a political and international affairs expert with Chatham House, a think tank in London.

“We’re waiting for the decisions, but we are not very, I would say, optimistic,” said Arjana Qosaj Mustafa of the Kosovo Women’s Network, an umbrella group of 140 NGOs. “But nevertheless, we are resilient. So we’ll try to do our best.”

Emboldened by his reelection and with help from presidential friend Elon Musk, Trump has unleashed his signature chaos by distraction on the world.

Outside of leadership circles, anyone who depends on U.S. aid for food and medicine is coming to grips with the life-and-death implications of not having it after Trump’s drive to dismantle USAID and its six-decade mission to stabilize countries by providing humanitarian aid. The Vatican charity voiced outrage Monday at what it called “unhuman” U.S. plans to gut USAID,

A story of ‘flooding the zone’ and examples set​

Presidential orders and utterances — he’s suggested annexing Canada and taking over the Panama Canal — occur at a speed that can atomize opposition. No one person or government can keep track of them all. And that, rather than clarity, is the effect of what Trump’s allies call “flooding the zone.”

Got a problem with it? Trump has an answer: “Fafo,” short for “mess around and find out,” except the first word isn’t ”mess.” The president posted the acronym on social media, complete with a photo of him in a fedora and pinstripes.

Ask Colombia what happens when you say no to Trump. Its president briefly resisted planeloads of immigrants during Trump’s first week — until the 47th US president threatened the country with as much as a 50% hike in tariffs. Colombia accepted the immigrants. Boom, example set.

The enforcement technique has long delighted Trump’s supporters, who turned out for him during the 2024 election heavily influenced by their anxiety over the economy and their own finances, according to APVotecast. Trump says he’s trying to save taxpayer money and spend it on issues that align with American interests.

Take Greenland and the Gaza Strip. The isolationist, “America first” president says the U.S. will do so. He eventually ruled out using the military to move Gaza’s 2 million people elsewhere, but his plan to develop the seaside enclave into a luxury resort apparently stands.


Never mind that friends and foes alike, from the volatile Mideast to China and the staid UK, have cast the idea as a nonstarter. Powerful Saudi Arabia issued an “absolute rejection” of it. Or that it could jeopardize the fragile hostages-for-prisoners ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas war, Egypt’s peace deal with Israel. It could violate international law, too.

Also, Palestinians streaming back to what once were their homes after 15 months of relentless air raids overwhelmingly say they’re not leaving. But Trump’s plan has found support in Israel, with leaders there taking care to say leaving would be “voluntary” rather than forced expulsion, which would be a war crime.

World leaders scramble to lead​

“We are not a bad ally,” Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen found it necessary to tell reporters last week, like other leaders on their heels as they respond to the Trump administration.

In this case, according to the Copenhagen Post, Frederiksen was responding to comments by Vice President JD Vance on Fox News’ “Sunday Morning Futures,” that the EU and NATO member nation was “not being a good ally.” He repeated that an American acquisition of Greenland was “possible.”

That came after Frederiksen had flown to European capitals last month to urge other countries on the continent to respond with one voice against Trump’s vow to make Greenland part of the United States. Denmark also has legislation to crack down on racism toward Greenlanders and has sent $2 billion to the Arctic island for its security.

The sentiment is spreading to larger groups. A recent meeting of EU leaders in Brussels that was supposed to be about boosting defense against the Russian threat became very much about Trump.

“We have to do everything to avoid this totally unnecessary and stupid tariff war or trade war,” Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk told reporters. He said Trump’s threats of tariffs on the EU amount to “a serious test” of European unity, and “It’s the first time where we have such a problem among allies.” Europe’s leaders said they were going to wait to see the details of what Trump is proposing.

In Greenland, meanwhile, Trump’s remarks have fueled a generational fight for full independence from Denmark and become a key issue ahead of elections in March. Some of its leaders have said the world’s largest island, home to 57,000 people, doesn’t want to be part of the United States or Denmark.

“The unfortunate rhetoric has caused a lot of worry and concern not only in Greenland but the rest of the Western Alliance,” Naaja H. Nathanielsen, Greenland’s minister of business and trade, told The Associated Press.

 

[wausauhawk]

View embedded media

So my question is this - it's pretty widely known everyone in the 2nd Trump administration is a sychofant. So is this guy just saying what Trump wants to hear, or is he really this dumb? Cuz God help us if this is the level of thinkers Trump has surrounded himself with.

 

[bhawk24bob]

It's almost like President Trump doesn't know how to run a successful business, which requires basics like political and legal stability and not non-stop chaos

 

[lonestar50]

But wait, there's more!

Farmers on the hook for millions after Trump freezes USDA funds​

The White House had repeatedly said the funding freeze would not affect benefits that go directly to individuals.

February 10, 2025

By Daniel Wu
Gaya Gupta
and
Anumita Kaur

Farmers report missing millions of dollars of funding they were promised by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, despite promises from the Trump administration that a federal funding freeze would not apply to projects directly benefiting individuals.

On his first day in office, President Donald Trump ordered the USDA to freeze funds for several programs designated by President Joe Biden’s signature clean-energy and health-care law, the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act. The freeze paused some funding for the department’s Environmental Quality Incentives Program, which helps farmers address natural resource concerns, and the Rural Energy for America Program, which provides financial assistance for farmers to improve their infrastructure.

Farmers who signed contracts with the USDA under those programs paid up front to build fencing, plant new crops and install renewable energy systems with guarantees that the federal government would issue grants and loan guarantees to cover at least part of their costs. Now, with that money frozen, they’re on the hook.

Laura Beth Resnick, who runs a Maryland flower farm, said she signed a contract for the USDA to cover half of a $72,900 solar panel installation. In late January, she said, she was told her reimbursement payment was rejected because of Trump’s executive order.

“I really don’t know what we would do,” Resnick said. “It just feels like I can’t even really think about it.”

The USDA has also halted funding for other programs, including scientific research grants in agriculture and producing climate-smart crops, according to a letter sent to the agency Thursday from House Democrats on the Agriculture and Appropriations committees.

“Pulling the rug out from these recipients runs counter to the mission of the USDA and will quickly and significantly cripple economic development in rural America,” the letter says.


The White House repeatedly said the freeze of agriculture funding and other federal financial assistance would not affect benefits that go directly to individuals, such as farmers. The administration rescinded the pause after a federal judge temporarily halted its implementation.

But over the weekend, farmers reported that their funding remained frozen — another blow to farmers who are also facing threats of tariffs and freezes to foreign-aid spending that involved food purchased from American producers.

In a statement, a USDA spokesperson said the Trump administration “rightfully has asked for a comprehensive review of all contracts, work, and personnel across all federal agencies.”

“Anything that violates the President’s Executive Orders will be subject for review,” the statement said. “The Department of Agriculture will be happy to provide a response to interested parties once Brooke Rollins is confirmed [as secretary of agriculture] and has the opportunity to analyze these reviews.”

The White House did not respond to a request for comment.

The disruption to funds appropriated through the Inflation Reduction Act takes aim at one of Biden’s flagship legislative accomplishments. Most of that funding was doled out in the last month of his presidency, according to a Washington Post analysis. But grants worth $32 billion authorized under the act remain vulnerable to being frozen.

The USDA made $3.1 billion from the Inflation Reduction Act available in the 2024 fiscal year for climate-smart agriculture activities, according to the department, including grants and loans for initiatives such as the Environmental Quality Incentives Program and the Rural Energy for America Program.

On Wednesday, National Farmers Union President Rob Larew testified before the Senate Agriculture Committee that the Trump administration’s sweeping decisions on federal funding were creating concern for farmers across the country.

“No one knows what funding will be available or if key programs will have the staff needed to operate,” Larew said. “Freezing spending and making sweeping decisions without congressional oversight just adds more uncertainty to an already tough farm economy.”

Skylar Holden, a cattle farmer in eastern Missouri, said he signed a $240,000 contract in December under the Environmental Quality Incentives Program to share costs on investments for his farm.
With the funding, Holden erected new fencing and installed a well. He had planned further improvements to his farm’s water system and spent $80,000 on materials and labor contracts that he expected would be partly paid back by the government.

This month, a USDA representative told him the funding was paused because of Trump’s executive order.
“I asked her, ‘Is there any word on when they’re going to be unfrozen?’” Holden said. “‘Is it going to be frozen indefinitely?’ She didn’t have any answers for me.”

The department suggested that Holden’s only recourse was to contact his congressional representatives, he said.

With the money promised in his contract on hold, Holden said he’s in a bind. Up-front payments for the construction and materials he arranged for are due soon, on top of his regular operating expenses. The terms of his contract also stipulate that he must pay back the money he has already received from the department, plus interest, if he does not complete all the development outlined in the contract within five years. If the freeze continues, he said, he will have to take out additional loans or sell his farm equipment and cattle.

“If I sell them out to make this payment, I’m hurting myself years down the line,” Holden said. “I’m robbing myself of the future.”

Resnick, the flower farmer in Maryland, received a grant from the Rural Energy for America Program last year, she said. The initiative provides loan financing and grant funding to agricultural producers and rural small businesses to make energy efficiency improvements.

The grant was slated for solar panel installation on Resnick’s farm — an improvement she said would save her farm $5,000 a year and be better for the environment. Now, with the contract seemingly suspended, Resnick doesn’t know what to do.

“We don’t have a whole lot of capital to hire a lawyer,” she said.

The funding freezes have also paused large projects across states. The Iowa Soybean Association said Thursday that USDA payments had been suspended for a five-year Midwest Climate Smart Commodity grant that the organization secured in 2022. The $95 million deal supports more than 1,000 farms in 12 Midwestern states and encourages conservation practices in producing corn, soybeans, wheat and sugar beets, the association said.

Hundreds of participating farmers are owed $11 million after investing in new farming practices and crops because of the program, the association said.

Resnick said she’s at a loss for what to do next with the government’s promised payment of around $36,000 on hold. She is already paying back a loan she took out to launch her farm. Taking out another one would be unimaginable.

“It scares me for the future of farming,” Resnick said. “Not just that funding won’t be available for new farmers that need it, but that farmers won’t trust the government going forward.”

 

[mnole03]

I’m surprised businesses don’t like chaotic policy decisions and day-to-day tariff threats.

 

[SolarHawk]

I think there is time for Trump to pull back from this trade war policy. If he uses it a negotiating tool, then more power to him. If he imposes tariffs on the US's biggest trade partners (friend or foe), I feel this will greatly weaken our economy and cause extreme inflation. Focuses tariffs on China and Russia make sense to me, broad tariffs on Canada and Mexico is truly idiotic.

If he doesn’t we are headed for a world of hurt. The day after the tariffs were announced every single roofing supplier put out a statement of material cost increases of 6-10% April 1st. Even if he pulls back, damage has already been done. If they go through we could legitimately be looking at another Great Depression.

 

[Hawgk]

Buyers remorse? I was told before the election that 90% of CEO’s were going to vote for Harris.

 

[5545]

For CEOs and Bankers, the Trump Euphoria Is Fading Fast​

Deals market gets curtailed by uncertainty delivered in president’s first weeks​

By
Lauren Thomas

Feb. 9, 2025

It took less than a month for the second Trump administration to cool the enthusiasm of chief executives and dealmakers.

Consumer sentiment is down and inflation expectations are rising, driven in part by worries about the impact of a threatened trade war. The deals market just ended its quietest January in a decade. A Justice Department that was expected to wave through acquisitions instead sued to block a big technology merger.
Corporate bigwigs are now using phrases like “fragility,” “volatility” and “wait and see” to describe their outlooks.

“Nobody knows what’s up,” Nick Pinchuk, chief executive of toolmaker Snap-on, said on a conference call Thursday. “It’s like being on Space Mountain at Disney World. You get on Space Mountain, you get in a car, and you’re in the dark and the cars go left and right, left and right and abrupt turns, you don’t know where you’re going, but you know, you’re pretty confident that you’re going to get to the right place at the bottom.”

The recent whipsaw on tariffs seemed to hit hardest on business leaders’ confidence. President Trump announced plans to stick 25% tariffs on imports from Canada and Mexico, only to delay them for a month a few days later. A number of executives, as well as top investment bankers and other industry advisers, have said that priorities have shifted in recent days to navigating tariffs and other policy issues.

They need to settle supply routes, discuss whether to raise their own prices and figure out what is even happening. That doesn’t leave much room for thinking about big bet-the-company deals.

The reaction is evident in the deals market. Just under 900 deals were announced in the U.S. in January, according to data from LSEG. That compares with more than 1,200 transactions in the previous January and over 1,500 two years ago.

Even the hope of a lighter regulatory touch has taken a knock. The Justice Department sued to block Hewlett Packard Enterprise’s $14 billion deal to buy Juniper Networks. The companies, which make wireless networking products for large corporate customers, plan to defend the deal.

Not all of the deal trouble can be blamed on the macroenvironment. Buyers and sellers have to find agreement on many details, and those talks can falter for many reasons. A deal to combine Japanese automakers Nissan and Honda appears on the brink of collapse, and Bausch Health said its efforts to unload its Bausch + Lomb eye-care subsidiary to a private-equity suitor have sputtered.

There are still some CEOs eager to do deals, even if their counterparts are wary. There were six hostile or unsolicited deals announced in January, a level not seen in a month since May 2018, according to LSEG data.

Cintas, a maker of workplace products, made a $5.1 billion offer for smaller uniform supplier UniFirst that has been rebuffed several times. Building-products distributor QXO has launched a hostile bid for Beacon Roofing Supply, which in turn launched a poison pill to try to stop QXO.

Executives and Wall Street still remain optimistic about the full year and predict more deals than in recent years.

“The much anticipated M&A tsunami of 2025 has yet to make landfall, but the conditions are all still ripe for that to arrive later this year,” said Jim Langston, an M&A partner at the law firm Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison.

Langston said that while the past month or so has been more unpredictable, historically M&A activity doesn’t increase after a U.S. presidential inauguration until the start of the second quarter.

He and others say private-equity clients also expect to be more active later this year, for instance. Private-equity firm Sycamore is still trying to pull off a takeover of Walgreens Boots Alliance, as The Wall Street Journal reported, according to people familiar with the matter.

But to get those deals done, CEOs will need to find more comfort than they have today. A day after the election, David Galullo, CEO of the San Francisco design firm Rapt Studio, told his employees that he knew they were likely experiencing a whirl of emotions. Though he didn’t vote for Trump, he was trying to stay optimistic about the president’s early days for the economy.

The first two weeks, though, left Galullo concerned. He is planning to address his team again, but is at a loss for words because so much is happening so quickly.

“I don’t know what to say,” he said.

I didn't read anything that attempted to quantify a change in CEO sentiment, let alone anything that indicates "buyers' remorse." The article even said that you typically don't see an uptick in activity until Q2 following an inauguration.

Trade wars and saber rattling are dumb. This article and thread title are also silly.

 

[BioHawk]

If only somebody had warned them!!!!

 

[BioHawk]

Buyers remorse? I was told before the election that 90% of CEO’s were going to vote for Harris.

Who told you that and why did you believe them?

 

[Hammerhead02]

If he doesn’t we are headed for a world of hurt. The day after the tariffs were announced every single roofing supplier put out a statement of material cost increases of 6-10% April 1st. Even if he pulls back, damage has already been done. If they go through we could legitimately be looking at another Great Depression.

🙄 Although, tariffs on steel and aluminum will increase construction costs. Rent will go up and less new housing will be built. Great for inflation.

 

[Jimmy McGill]

Trump:

 

[Whiskeydeltadeltatango]

I've been up and going since 415. I don't even remember what airport I was in when I responded with that.

* time stamp would say Denver


*And I think I may have left my truck door open at DSM, and I have 58 minutes to get to the resort, get checked in, get to the course and tee off.



But good news, my travels have taken me from 11 degrees to 80.

Shot a 91 on the Devils Claw course of Whirlwind. Not bad for not swinging the club in 3 months. Not great compared to the company I'm playing with. Hit several balls fat, still cant putt, going to blame it on 4 hours sleep and 6 hours of airplane prior to tee off.


1:06 tee time tmrw.

 

[Whiskeydeltadeltatango]

Buyers remorse? I was told before the election that 90% of CEO’s were going to vote for Harris.

Shhhhh, or the fact the data was collected within 2 weeks of him being in office.



Republicans and Independents like what Trump is doing, democrats hate it.

 

[torbee]

Hey, at least he's bringing Christians and Jews together.

27 religious groups sue Trump administration to protect houses of worship from immigration arrests​

• DAVID CRARY AP National Writer

More than two-dozen Christian and Jewish groups representing millions of Americans — ranging from the Episcopal Church and the Union for Reform Judaism to the Mennonites and Unitarian Universalists — filed a federal court lawsuit Tuesday challenging a Trump administration move giving immigration agents more leeway to make arrests at houses of worship.

The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Washington, contends that the new policy is spreading fear of raids, thus lowering attendance at worship services and other valuable church programs. The result, says the suit, infringes on the groups' religious freedom — namely their ability to minister to migrants, including those in the United States illegally.

"We have immigrants, refugees, people who are documented and undocumented," said the Most Rev. Sean Rowe, the presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church.

"We cannot worship freely if some of us are living in fear," he told The Associated Press. "By joining this lawsuit, we're seeking the ability to gather and fully practice our faith, to follow Jesus' command to love our neighbors as ourselves."

The new lawsuit echoes and expands on some of the arguments made in a similar lawsuit filed Jan. 27 by five Quaker congregations and later joined by the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship and a Sikh temple. It is currently pending in U.S. District Court in Maryland.
There was no immediate Trump administration response to the new lawsuit, which names the Department of Homeland Security and its immigration enforcement agencies as defendants. However, a memorandum filed Friday by the Department of Justice, opposing the thrust of the Quaker lawsuit, outlined arguments that may also apply to the new lawsuit.

In essence, the memo contended that the plaintiffs' request to block the new enforcement policy is based on speculation of hypothetical future harm — and thus is insufficient grounds for issuing an injunction.

The memo said that immigration enforcement affecting houses of worship had been permitted for decades, and the new policy announced in January simply said that field agents — using "common sense" and "discretion" — could now conduct such operations without pre-approval from a supervisor.

One part of that memo might not apply to the new lawsuit, as it argued the Quakers and their fellow plaintiffs have no basis for seeking a nationwide injunction against the revised enforcement policy.

"Any relief in this case should be tailored solely to the named plaintiffs," said the DOJ memo, contending that any injunction should not apply to other religious organizations.

The plaintiffs in the new lawsuit represent a vastly larger swath of American worshippers — including more than 1 million followers of Reform Judaism, the estimated 1.5 million Episcopalians in 6,700 congregations nationwide, nearly 1.1 million members of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), and the estimated 1.5 million active members of the African Methodist Episcopal Church — the country's oldest predominantly Black denomination.

One of the plaintiffs is the Latino Christian National Network, which seeks to bring together Latino leaders with different traditions and values to collaborate on pressing social issues. The network's president is the Rev. Carlos Malavé, a pastor of two churches in Virginia, who described to the AP what network members are observing.

"There is deep-seated fear and distrust of our government," he said. "People fear going to the store, they are avoiding going to church. ... The churches are increasingly doing online services because people fear for the well-being of their families and children."

The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, which leads the nation's largest denomination, did not join the lawsuit, though it has criticized Trump's migration crackdown. On Tuesday, Pope Francis issued a major rebuke to the deportation plan, warning that the forceful removal of people purely because of their illegal status deprives them of their inherent dignity and "will end badly."

Many conservative faith leaders and legal experts across the U.S. do not share concerns about the new arrest policy.

"Places of worship are for worship and are not sanctuaries for illegal activity or for harboring people engaged in illegal activity," said Mat Staver, founder of the conservative Christian legal organization Liberty Counsel.

"Fugitives or criminals are not immune from the law merely because they enter a place of worship," he said via email. "This is not a matter of religious freedom. There is no right to openly violate the law and disobey law enforcement."

Professor Cathleen Kaveny, who teaches in the theology department and law school at Boston College, questioned whether the plaintiffs would prevail with the religious freedom argument, but suggested the Trump administration might be unwise to disregard a traditional view of houses of worship as places of sanctuary for vulnerable people.

"These buildings are different — almost like embassies," she said. "I think of churches as belonging to an eternal country."

 

[Sullivan]

Hey, at least he's bringing Christians and Jews together.

27 religious groups sue Trump administration to protect houses of worship from immigration arrests​

• DAVID CRARY AP National Writer

More than two-dozen Christian and Jewish groups representing millions of Americans — ranging from the Episcopal Church and the Union for Reform Judaism to the Mennonites and Unitarian Universalists — filed a federal court lawsuit Tuesday challenging a Trump administration move giving immigration agents more leeway to make arrests at houses of worship.

The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Washington, contends that the new policy is spreading fear of raids, thus lowering attendance at worship services and other valuable church programs. The result, says the suit, infringes on the groups' religious freedom — namely their ability to minister to migrants, including those in the United States illegally.

"We have immigrants, refugees, people who are documented and undocumented," said the Most Rev. Sean Rowe, the presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church.

"We cannot worship freely if some of us are living in fear," he told The Associated Press. "By joining this lawsuit, we're seeking the ability to gather and fully practice our faith, to follow Jesus' command to love our neighbors as ourselves."

The new lawsuit echoes and expands on some of the arguments made in a similar lawsuit filed Jan. 27 by five Quaker congregations and later joined by the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship and a Sikh temple. It is currently pending in U.S. District Court in Maryland.
There was no immediate Trump administration response to the new lawsuit, which names the Department of Homeland Security and its immigration enforcement agencies as defendants. However, a memorandum filed Friday by the Department of Justice, opposing the thrust of the Quaker lawsuit, outlined arguments that may also apply to the new lawsuit.

In essence, the memo contended that the plaintiffs' request to block the new enforcement policy is based on speculation of hypothetical future harm — and thus is insufficient grounds for issuing an injunction.

The memo said that immigration enforcement affecting houses of worship had been permitted for decades, and the new policy announced in January simply said that field agents — using "common sense" and "discretion" — could now conduct such operations without pre-approval from a supervisor.

One part of that memo might not apply to the new lawsuit, as it argued the Quakers and their fellow plaintiffs have no basis for seeking a nationwide injunction against the revised enforcement policy.

"Any relief in this case should be tailored solely to the named plaintiffs," said the DOJ memo, contending that any injunction should not apply to other religious organizations.

The plaintiffs in the new lawsuit represent a vastly larger swath of American worshippers — including more than 1 million followers of Reform Judaism, the estimated 1.5 million Episcopalians in 6,700 congregations nationwide, nearly 1.1 million members of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), and the estimated 1.5 million active members of the African Methodist Episcopal Church — the country's oldest predominantly Black denomination.

One of the plaintiffs is the Latino Christian National Network, which seeks to bring together Latino leaders with different traditions and values to collaborate on pressing social issues. The network's president is the Rev. Carlos Malavé, a pastor of two churches in Virginia, who described to the AP what network members are observing.

"There is deep-seated fear and distrust of our government," he said. "People fear going to the store, they are avoiding going to church. ... The churches are increasingly doing online services because people fear for the well-being of their families and children."

The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, which leads the nation's largest denomination, did not join the lawsuit, though it has criticized Trump's migration crackdown. On Tuesday, Pope Francis issued a major rebuke to the deportation plan, warning that the forceful removal of people purely because of their illegal status deprives them of their inherent dignity and "will end badly."

Many conservative faith leaders and legal experts across the U.S. do not share concerns about the new arrest policy.

"Places of worship are for worship and are not sanctuaries for illegal activity or for harboring people engaged in illegal activity," said Mat Staver, founder of the conservative Christian legal organization Liberty Counsel.

"Fugitives or criminals are not immune from the law merely because they enter a place of worship," he said via email. "This is not a matter of religious freedom. There is no right to openly violate the law and disobey law enforcement."

Professor Cathleen Kaveny, who teaches in the theology department and law school at Boston College, questioned whether the plaintiffs would prevail with the religious freedom argument, but suggested the Trump administration might be unwise to disregard a traditional view of houses of worship as places of sanctuary for vulnerable people.

"These buildings are different — almost like embassies," she said. "I think of churches as belonging to an eternal country."

Shocker. These 27 religious groups are the same ones that have been receiving money from the federal government to house illegals.

Hopefully, this money gets clawed back.

 

[MitchLL]

Let it burn.

Numpties deserve all the pain they receive.

Like I said, in four years another Dem President will be tasked with picking up the pieces of a Republican Presidency.

People never learn.

 

[Whiskeydeltadeltatango]

Told ya, hopefully you atleast enjoyed the bowl.

 

[torbee]

https://www.wsj.com/economy/trump-business-uncertainty-tariffs-immigration-energy-ef57cfbb?st=97FtVZ&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink

 

[soonerinlOUisiana]

Why should immigration criminals be allowed sanctuary in churches, but not drug pushers, murderers, rapists, thieves, etc. I’m just not seeing why a particular class of lawbreakers should get special treatment. Kind of like a particular class of perverts getting special treatment with all the LGBT shit.

 

[torbee]

Why should immigration criminals be allowed sanctuary in churches, but not drug pushers, murderers, rapists, thieves, etc. I’m just not seeing why a particular class of lawbreakers should get special treatment. Kind of like a particular class of perverts getting special treatment with all the LGBT shit.

A non-dumb person would differentiate between crimes that physically harm humans versus crimes that are essentially geographic bad luck.

But here we are.

 

[jneffer]

A non-dumb person would differentiate between crimes that physically harm humans versus crimes that are essentially geographic bad luck.

But here we are.

or they would just read the article you copied and pasted that explains why the people making that request think its necessary

 

[SI_NYC]

The article doesn't seem to match the headline.

Except for maybe the CEO from the San Francisco company, who didn't vote for Trump in the first place trying to contain the "whirl of emotions".

Well you are wrong again. I'm not sure why you find it hard to believe. Businesses need stability to make sound business decisions. Trump is providing the opposite of stability.