Stock market soars to records on Trump election victory

Donald Trump: Thank you very much. Wow. 

Simone Del Rosario: The Trump trade is back on and bigger than ever. The stock market surged to record highs Wednesday morning on news former President Donald Trump is now President-elect.

News clip: The markets really do enjoy this choice.

News clip: Look at all the futures, right? The market likes it, it’s rallying.

Simone Del Rosario: The Dow Jones soared up 1,300 points, around 3%, to start the day. 

Trump Media, which trades like a meme stock on Trump’s political momentum, opened the day 30% higher. 

And he’s not the only one with the largest share of a public company seeing a spike. 

Donald Trump: Who did you say? Oh, let me tell you. We have a new star. A star is born. Elon!

Simone Del Rosario: Tesla got a big Trump bounce too, popping about 13% to start the trading day. 

It’s expected CEO Elon Musk will play a big role in Trump’s administration. 

Donald Trump: I will create a government efficiency commission tasked with conducting a complete financial and performance audit of the entire federal government and making recommendations for drastic reforms. And Elon, because he’s not very busy, has agreed to hit that task force.

Simone Del Rosario: Musk spent well over $100 million on Trump’s campaign through his America PAC. That included the million-dollar daily giveaways he issued through the campaign’s final weeks. 

Musk posted on his social platform, X: “America is a nation of builders. Soon, you will be free to build.” 

The stock market bounce comes in part from the expectations the Trump administration will mean fewer regulations and lower taxes.  

Sylvia Jablonski: I think investors and voters are, you know, kind of voting that they want change here. So it’s, it’s arguably what we want. And we’ll have to see what policies go into play and what happens. 

Simone Del Rosario: Also riding Trump’s victory coattails is the dollar, which surged as other major currencies like the euro fell. 

But cryptocurrencies are on the rise. 

Anthony Pompliano: One of the most important things is we have the first Bitcoin president. President Trump ran on a campaign point that he was going to protect Bitcoin, he was going to create a Bitcoin strategic reserve, and I think you saw Bitcoin’s price reflect having somebody who was so pro-Bitcoin win the White House. 

Simone Del Rosario: Bitcoin traded around $75,000 in the early morning hours. 

Along with foreign currencies, other “losers” of the Trump trade are green energy companies and shipping companies. 

The prime piece of his economic platform is tariffs, of which shipping companies could be on the losing end of a trade war. 

Trump has said revenues from widespread tariffs will not only bring production back to the U.S. but also reduce the deficit, even as he pledges to cut tax revenues. 

Donald Trump: It will be a certain tariff percentage, which will be higher than people had heard in the past, and we will be bringing in billions and billions of dollars, which will directly reduce our deficits.

Simone Del Rosario: The question as Trump’s new term comes into focus is how many of his campaign pledges will be fully realized, especially with certain advisors in play. 

When Trump raised tariffs on China during his first term, Elon Musk’s Tesla was one of thousands of companies to sue his administration. 

This time around, Trump has said tariffs on China will be 60% or more. But China is very important to Tesla’s business. Will Musk’s influence lead to a softer stance? 

David Walker: This is what I call the silly season. Lots of promises are made. I think what’s more realistic is you could see selected imposition of tariffs on certain goods from certain countries in order to try to help level the playing field and in order to try to help promote more domestic jobs. But you’re not going to see, I think, across the board approaches, and you’re not going to see, you know, a fundamental shift away from our historical revenue sources, because the gap is just too great.

Simone Del Rosario: For now, all independent analyses have to go on are those promises made, in which case, the right-of-center Tax Foundation says Trump’s collection of tax cuts and tariff increases will reduce the nation’s revenues by $3 trillion over the next decade. 

To get a historical look at Trump’s proposal to replace the income tax with tariffs, search for this specific story at SAN.com or the Straight Arrow News app using the term, “Trump tariffs.”