Donald Trump’s retreat from his tariff threats over Greenland this week followed a sharp stock sell-off, underscoring investors’ power to influence the US president even as he brushes off Washington’s top allies.
US stocks shed more than $1tn on Tuesday in one of the worst sell-offs since Trump’s “liberation day” tariff announcement in April. The president shrugged off the fall as “peanuts” compared with the market’s gains over the past year but he ditched his plans for steep levies on the UK, France, Germany and others by Wednesday afternoon.
“There is certainly a sensitivity in the administration about what happens in the stock market,” said Kristina Hooper, chief market strategist at Man Group, an investment firm with $214bn in assets under management.