How a game of broken telephone added then subtracted $4 trillion in market value

The news may have been fake, but the market’s desire for tariff relief is very, very real.

4/7/25 2:32PM

President Trump’s top economic adviser, Kevin Hassett, appeared on Fox News on Monday morning and said nothing particularly remarkable. Then the stock market ripped, adding roughly $4 trillion in value, before giving it back.

Markets reacted to a headline that appeared on Bloomberg terminals, X, and other forums where investors have been watching the value of stocks sink as Trump’s tariff policy threatens to upend global trade and push the US economy into a recession. The alert — which according to 404 Media originated from Benzinga, leaning on misquotes of Hassett on X — said: “HASSETT: TRUMP IS CONSIDERING A 90-DAY PAUSE IN TARIFFS FOR ALL COUNTRIES EXCEPT CHINA”

Often headlines for important, fast-moving news will appear on Bloomberg terminals or other market data services first before details are available. (Misattributing the sourcing of this headline amid the frenzy was something our markets editor dropped the ball on, too.)

Eager for good news, traders (and algorithms set up to respond to headlines) bought back stocks, temporarily erasing some of the heavy losses global markets have withstood since “Liberation Day.” The problem was, the administration hadn’t actually budged on tariffs.

When asked by Fox News if the president would consider a 90-day pause, Hassett responded, “I think the president is going to decide what the president is going to decide.” Somehow that was misconstrued, more than an hour after the interview, to mean tariff relief is on the table.

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told CNBC the headline going around was “fake news,” a term Trump’s camp uses often but was unusually appropriate today.

The headline spread like wildfire on X, where it was picked up by a class of day trader accounts that tweet breaking news headlines, usually from real news sources, but don’t include attribution or a link. One of them, who goes by the name Walter Bloomberg, has been catching some of the flack for the mistake and said they got the headline from Reuters.

the most remarkable thing about this clip is that, in this moment of massive volatility, CNBC was fine with running with speculative language about a Hassett quote they couldn't source. "I think we can run with this headline," "we'll try and source that exactly" — huh! https://t.co/8Uju01mGZO
— Corbin Bolies (@CorbinBolies) April 7, 2025

A spokesperson for Reuters told Sherwood News that its headline was “drawing from a headline on CNBC.” The network did run that headline on air, but its unclear if it was drawing from its own newsroom’s reporting or if it was the same headline everyone else was fooled by.

“Reuters has withdrawn the incorrect report and regrets its error,” the spokesperson said. Comcast, which owns CNBC, did not immediately respond to a request for comment but confirmed to The Wall Street Journal that it ran “unconfirmed information in a banner” on air.

The finger-pointing over who’s responsible for the $4 trillion screwup will likely continue, but one thing it did make clear amid the chaos and confusion is that investors desperately want relief from tariffs, and any easing on those import taxes stands to reverse some of the stock market’s hefty losses.

Max Knoblauch40m

Ford raises its full-year guidance, receives $1.3 billion tariff refund

Ford reported its first-quarter results after markets closed on Wednesday. The automaker’s shares climbed roughly 7% in after-hours trading on the news.

For Q1, Ford reported:

Adjusted earnings of $0.66 per share, compared to the $0.18 per share expected by Wall Street analysts polled by FactSet. The figure includes Ford’s tariff reimbursement.
$43.25 in total revenue, vs. the $42.66 billion consensus forecast. Automotive revenue came in at $39.8 billion, compared to estimates of $38.9 billion.
A $1.3 billion tariff refund.

Ford boosted its full-year guidance for adjusted earnings before interest and taxes to between $8.5 billion and $10.5 billion, up from between $8 billion and $10 billion.

Late last year, Ford announced it would take $19.5 billion in charges — one of the largest write-downs ever — relating mostly to its EV business. Of those charges, $7 billion will be spread across this year and next, the company said.

Earlier this month, Ford recorded an 8.8% drop in Q1 sales from the same period last year, a similar result to Detroit rival GM, which posted a 9.7% sales drop.

Jon Keegan47m

Microsoft beats on revenue and earnings in Q3, but only meets expectations for cloud growth

Microsoft shares dipped after the company reported strong Q3 earnings post-market Wednesday, posting sales of $82.9 billion for the quarter, beating FactSet analyst estimates of $81.4 billion. Earnings per share were $4.27 handily beating estimates of $4.05.

In a closely watched number, Microsoft’s Azure cloud business increased 40% on year, just above the 39.7% estimated. The closely-watched metric technically beat expectations, but may not be the beat investors were looking for.

Total capital expenditure for the quarter was $31.9 billion, up 49% year on year, above estimates of $27.5 billion and down from Q2’s $37.5 billion.

Microsoft reported a $627 billion backlog of commercial bookings (known as RPO), growing 99%.

One thing investors were eager to find out – how is the company doing in its effort to fulfill the billions in backlogged commercial bookings (known as RPO)? Last quarter, the company reported a staggering $625 billion in RPOs, and 45% of that was for just one customer — OpenAI.

For the third quarter, Microsoft reported a backlog of, $627 billion, up 99% year on year. The company said the RPO increase was 26% — in line with “historical seasonality” — when excluding OpenAI.

Breaking down the results by the company’s business lines:

☁️ 🤖 “Intelligent Cloud” (Azure, server products): $34.7 billion in revenue, up 30% year on year.
📝 📊 “Productivity and Business Processes” (Microsoft 365, LinkedIn, Dynamics): $35 billion in revenue, up 17% year on year.
💻 🎮 “More Personal Computing” (Windows, Xbox, Bing): $13.2 billion in revenue, down 1% year on year.

Microsoft CFO Amy Hood said in the earnings release:

“We delivered results that exceeded expectations across revenue, operating income, and earnings per share, reflecting strong execution and growing demand for the Microsoft Cloud.”

Max Knoblauch

51m

Carvana reports better-than-expected Q1 sales, gross profit per vehicle

Carvana reported its first-quarter earnings after markets closed on Wednesday.