People often say "everything was better in the past". Looks like Americans will soon find out if that's true.

Think about it - 200,000 voters in four states. And the 40% who couldn’t be bothered. As France’s Europe Minister said “We cannot leave the security of Europe in the hands of voters in Wisconsin every 4 years”. They get it. We don’t.

Probably wearing a black suit this time?

Peolpe at Netflix (or basically any movie studio in the US) probably saw this today and were like "Dammit..."

Trump only does headline politics. He has zero interest in the implications and feasibility of his policies. Most of them make zero sense in reality and neither he nor his voters seem to care. All he does is marketing gimmicks for his personal brand.

I think Bidens policies supporting domestic manufacturing should be put more in the spotlight vs Trumps chaos. Like the CHIPS Act, IRA or Buy American EOs. Those were actually good policies.

It's funny how well regarded (and well paid) CEOs generally are, and in reality, investors can just hope that they are not too value destructive.

You are absolutely right, it matters a lot. What I meant is Trump is too stupid to understand it, so it does not matter to him.

I think that does not really matter since Trump only looks at direct exports.

Is he breaking apart, or why does he speak like this?

The USD is weakening, hurting consumption and reducing the trade deficit. Interest rates are rising, attracting more domestic saving but reducing also domestic investments. Government spending will have to decline abruptly. In the end this could lead to debt crisis and/or recession.

E) Trumps chaos moves some parts in the right direction, but at what costs? Foreigners will be much more reluctant to invest in the US, thus lead to a smaller capital surplus equal smaller current account deficit. This will be hurtful.

D) The better plan: Use the capital account surplus to gradually increase domestic investment vs consumption, then reduce government spending, and incentivize saving vs investment. If done right, this will, over time, reduce the trade deficit in an orderly way.

C) Trump wants to reduce trade deficits with the hammer to zero, but forgets that they finance current budget deficits. To balance the budget, he would need to raise taxes or massively cut spending, which is not happening. Also, he creates massive uncertainty, which hurts investments.

A) Trade deficits are like debt that needs to be paid back with future trade surpluses.

B) The global trade deficit of the US equals almost its budget deficit in size. Most of it, therefore, goes currently to debt financed consumption, not towards investment. This creates a problem for the future.