Donald Trump the Megathread part II - mod warnings in OP, Updated 18/03/25

They've jumped again there, apparently the Fed is in a closed meeting so something has obviously leaked from that

This is insane stuff : the markets going up and down like a yoyo every 30 minutes.

White house says fake news

https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/114297331052690348


Another 50% tariffs on china.

Apple are f**ked.

Apple has around 60% of the mobile phone market in the US, 50% tariff will drive their cheapest phone well over the thousand mark.

This reminds me so much of Brexit.

The US is trying to go its own and selling it as a win but it is going to do a lot of damage in the process and shatter long-term relationships with other nations.

I'm all for it if it means the US' role is lessened on the global stage. We were able to survive just fine after Brexit. I know there will be a lot more friction in this case but the entire world needs to stand up to bullies like the US and Russia.

maybe all this up and down with the stocks is due to the penguins driving a hard bargain with the tarrifs…?

I don't think so
there is this very weird oddity in US cities: iOS have massive market share:

1. New York – 79.74%
2. San Jose – 69.19%
3. Los Angeles – 65.81%
4. Chicago – 62.29%
5. San Diego – 60.53%
6. San Antonio – 59.68%
7. Houston – 59.33%
8. Philadelphia – 58.00%
9. Phoenix – 57.61%
10. Dallas – 57.59%

Mate of mine moved to NY a few years back, and he was doing the whole dating thing. He noticed that when he used his iPhone to message he had way better response rate from the wimminz (cause of the 2 blue ticks vs the 2 green ticks.. IE they knew he was or was not using iMessage)

Android is like an Ick in the USA.

Apple will be fine, they've been marketing slightly above average hardware as best in class for over 20 years at this stage.

Mostly down (except brief time) and shows that the problem lies with the monkey with grenade in the whitehouse

and

I'd say China have all this mapped out already, how they'll respond to different scenarios.

Wouldn't surprise me one bit if they pre-empt the +50% and announce now what they'll do if he does go ahead.

At what point do they start calling in the debt?

I know it's a lot more nuanced than that but it's a dangerous game to play

Thing is, it will eventually turn around and sure enough he will make claim to it's beautiful rise. Ignoring of course the damage done.

Negotiations with other countries will start immediately. So no big sell off on the China part, at least not yet.

What media is rooting for China?

Isn't it remarkable that the undertone across all media is sort of rooting for China in this, because America are being such absolute arséholes and China are seen as stable. It's a wild change in public opinion.

Human rights abusing autocratic communist regime not involved in foreign wars that wants to have stable trade and trade partnerships

or

Increasingly autocratic superpower with an addiction to war moving towards Christian nationalism and the eroding of civil liberties that wants to engage in mindless, braindead and pointless trade war with the world, while being run by an unelected man-child internet edge lord wrecking the government in order to gut departments investigating his businesses so he can use more tax dollars to fund his ego-fuelling enterprises, while the man elected by his demagogue worshipping cult followers throws out suicidal economic policies that change every few minutes depending on what type of toddler like mood he is in when he's tweeting more than a teenage girl, all while the cult in power move towards Idiocracy levels of stupidity.

Choices, choices, choices.