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Trump tirade against Fed chief slams rate-sensitive stocks

Goldman Sachs’ basket of rate-sensitive stocks was hit hard on Monday.

4/21/25 2:38PM

Despite the increasingly dire outlook for the US economy, long-term interest rates jumped on Monday after President Trump took to Truth Social to harangue Fed Chair Jerome Powell, yet again, for not cutting interest rates, prompting another sell-off in US assets like the dollar and Treasury bonds.

The TL;DR is that bond owners tend to like an independent central bank that doesn’t cut interest rates when political authorities demand. Why? Well, historically, subservient central bankers tend to generate inflation, which is the worst enemy of long-term bond investors.

Anyhoo, as bond prices fell, interest rates — which move in the opposite direction — rose, and stocks that tend to sell off when rates rise — among them investor favorites like Tesla, Apple, and Super Micro Computer — tumbled.

Goldman Sachs’ basket of such interest-sensitive US stocks was on track for a nearly 4% drop shortly before 2 p.m. ET, their worst tumble since the immediate aftermath of the White House’s Rose Garden tariff unveiling.

That makes sense, as there’s quite a bit of overlap between Goldman’s interest-sensitive stock basket and tech hardware stocks, which analysts have spotlighted as some of the most exposed to the downsides of Trump’s trade war.

But the day’s trading dynamic also underscores the fact that if Trump thinks interest rate cuts are going to be some magic salve for the economy or markets, he may be badly mistaken.

J. Edward Moreno43m

Lilly reports encouraging trial results for its next-gen GLP-1 shot

Eli Lilly released late-stage trial results for its next-generation GLP-1 shot, retatrutide, showing the drug helped patients lose more weight than anything currently on the market.

Patients taking the highest dose of retatrutide, 12 mg, lost 16.8% of their body weight after 40 weeks, more than its current best-seller, tirzepatide. The results also showed significant reduction in blood sugar levels.

The stock was flat in premarket trading following the news.

Lilly's tirzepatide, sold under the brand names Zepbound and Mounjaro, is currently the most-sold drug in the world. The company's sales have now outpaced its top-rival, Novo Nordisk, which was the first to bring a GLP-1 to market but has seen sales decelerate as competitors have muscled in.

Still, some expect Lilly's winning streak may not last forever. Analysts at HSBC gave the stock a rare downgrade earlier this week, citing a crowded market among other factors.

Tom Jones1h

Gold and silver dip amid inflation concerns and ongoing Iran war

Often seen as safe havens through times of uncertainty, precious metals aren't proving that way today, as oil prices spike amid escalations in the Iran war, compounding inflationary concerns and sending the SPDR Gold Shares ETF and iShares Silver Trust down 3.4% and 6.6%, respectively, at 6:55 a.m. ET.

Although the Fed kept rates steady yesterday, as was universally expected, officials raised their forecasts for inflation — a move which seems to have spooked investors, who had already been taking risk off the table in recent weeks. With Brent crude north of $114 per barrel this morning, investors look to be bracing for further inflationary shock and are dumping gold and silver, as implied odds of a Fed rate cut in June plummeted on prediction markets from 60% on February 23rd, to just 16% this morning.

The shiny metal slump is already weighing on mining stocks like Anglogold Ashanti, Newmont, Wheaton Precious Metals, and Agnico Eagle, which are all plunging in premarket trading.