Good morning. I once asked Donald Trump if he had ever turned down an offer to put his name on a product. His answer: coffins.
It didn’t matter that these were gorgeous, high-end coffins, he explained. He didn’t want his name associated with death. There was nothing aspirational or success-oriented about that. Coffins, he told me, were “off-brand.”
This was in 2007, a year when Trump had his own brand of vodka, steaks, water, furniture, shirts, suits, and ties, alongside the hotels, casinos, golf courses, modeling agency, educational company, and other ventures bearing his name. While the future president may have been battling critics over his net worth and decision to let Miss USA Tara Conner retain her crown if she entered rehab, he was still a media celebrity who was much in demand.
I was interviewing him at Trump Tower on a day when he was giving $10,000 to Wesley Autrey, a construction worker who had jumped on a subway track to save a man’s life. “In life, you have fighters and nonfighters. You have winners and losers,” Trump told me. “I am both a fighter and a winner.”
I thought of that this week after speaking to someone in Trump’s circle about the president’s desire to distance himself from any mention of his name next to Jeffrey Epstein. This associate framed the issue as one of personal branding. It didn’t matter if Trump’s association with Epstein was before the financier was accused of sex trafficking, this person argued. “Epstein will forever be a loser in people’s minds and Donald Trump doesn’t hang out with losers,” they said. “It’s off-brand.”
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Top news
Trump threatened to fire Powell, to his face
In yet another affront to the independence of the Fed, President Trump visited the central bank’s HQ to look at the renovations happening there and jokingly said he would fire Fed Chair Jerome Powell. He also falsely claimed that the construction bill at the building had risen to $3.1 billion, before Powell set him straight. There is an awkward video of the encounter here. Context: Dan Ivascyn, chief investment officer of Pimco, which manages $2.1 trillion in assets, told the FT that “any attempt to reduce independence would be very bad for markets.”
Trump reminded Musk he can still hurt him
The bickering between the world’s most powerful man and the world’s richest man continues. Yesterday, Trump posted “Everyone is stating that I will destroy Elon’s companies by taking away some, if not all, of the large scale subsidies he receives from the U.S. Government. This is not so! I want Elon, and all businesses within our Country, to THRIVE, in fact, THRIVE like never before!”
Trump said he initially wanted to break up Nvidia
With CEO Jensen Huang sitting in the audience, the president joked that his first instinct was to break up the U.S.’s most advanced semiconductor chip maker. Video here.
Vanguard investment chief cools on U.S. stocks
Vanguard chief investment officer Greg Davis told Fortune: “Our investment strategy group’s projection is that U.S. equity market returns are going to be much more muted in the future.” He warns. “Over the past 10 years, the S&P returned an average of 12.4% annually. We’re predicting the figure to drop to between 3.8% and 5.8% (midpoint of 4.8%) over the next decade.”
Volkswagen takes tariff hit
Quarterly operating profit at the automaker dropped 33% after the company ingested €1.3 billion in increased costs from U.S. trade tariffs.
Ray Dalio issues new deficit warning
Billionaire investor Ray Dalio is, again, sounding the alarm about national debt, this time warning of a coming “economic heart attack” if it isn’t addressed. “What you’re seeing is the debt service payments … squeezing away, so it’s like plaque in the arteries squeezing away buying power,” he recently told Fox Business.
Microsoft’s Nadella on layoffs and the “enigma of success”
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella sent a memo to company employees on Thursday describing why the company has laid off about 7% of its workforce this year despite Nadella himself describing the company as “thriving.” In the new age of AI, Nadella describes this as the “enigma of success in an industry that has no franchise value.”
The markets
S&P 500 futures were flat this morning, premarket, after the index closed marginally up at a new all-time high of 6,363.35 yesterday. Tesla declined 8.2% yesterday after a lousy earnings call. STOXX Europe 600 was down 0.34% in early trading. The U.K.’s FTSE 100 was down 0.39% in early trading. Japan’s Nikkei 225 was down 0.88%. China’s CSI 300 Index was down 0.53%. The South Korea KOSPI was up 0.18%. India’s Nifty 50 was down 0.86%. Bitcoin fell 2.76% t $115K.
From the analysts
EY-Parthenon on Fed independence: “Political pressure remains a growing risk to Fed independence. Reports that the administration is exploring ways to remove Chair Powell—potentially invoking a legally fragile “for cause” rationale—have unsettled markets. Even if such efforts don’t materialize, the perception alone could erode credibility and increase risk premia,” per Gregory Daco.
ING on home sales: “New home sales were annualised at 627,000 in June, well short of the 650,000 figure expected. Coming after yesterday’s disappointing existing home sales figure, which dropped to 3.93 million from 4.04 million in May, it heightens concerns about the property market, and by extension, housing construction,” per James Knightley.
Wedbush on Tesla: “Musk & Co. aim to have autonomous ride hailing in half the US population by the end of 2025 including Unsupervised FSD to be available for personal use in some US cities by late 2025 with plans in place to expand Robotaxis across Florida, Arizona, California, Nevada and more,” per Daniel Ives et al.
Around the watercooler
Inside the $99 million luxury wine scam that fooled over 100 global investors by Lily Mae Lazarus
Arizona woman in North Korean IT workers scheme sentenced to 8.5 years for helping to trick Fortune 500 companies out of millions by Amanda Gerut
Stanford dropout Sam Altman says college is ‘not working great’ for most people—and predicts major change in the next 18 years by Marco Quiroz-Gutierrez
Walmart–yes, Walmart–says AI agents are its future by Jason Del Rey
Bryan Johnson is hiring a CEO for his company, Blueprint, so he can focus on living forever by Eleanor Pringle
CEO Daily is compiled and edited by Joey Abrams and Jim Edwards.
