Ron Insana:
Yes, well, it’s interesting that you bring that up.
So Amazon, for instance, Jeff Bezos reportedly wants to buy TikTok, and so the president this afternoon suggested that they could get a great deal on TikTok from the Chinese company that owns it, ByteDance, that he might roll back tariffs on China. That would benefit any domestic purchaser of TikTok, whether it’s AppLovin, which is a company that has recently become popular on Wall Street, Amazon, or any other.
And, yes, he can pick those companies, those industries that are exempted from the tariffs, and, effectively, those who play ball with the president might get favorable treatment, and those who don’t would get unfavorable treatment. So it sets up almost, if you will, a crony capitalism-type situation in which those in favor benefit, those out of favor lose.
And not only that. That’s true with other countries as well. Whoever capitulates first will get a break, and whoever retaliates first will get hit even harder. In fact, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said early this morning, and I believe yesterday afternoon, that other countries shouldn’t retaliate.
Well, we already heard that many countries will, and so that could just escalate the trade war further and complicate what is already, I would argue, a chaotic situation.