From TACO to FAFO, investors love parodies of Trump acronyms
Four months into President Donald Trump's second term, market observers have taken a cue from his fondness for condensing slogans into catchy acronyms like MAGA, DOGE and MAHA, and devised a few of their own that have been spreading across trading desks. Even those acronyms that do not directly reflect a specific trading strategy, still capture factors that traders say are important in Trump-era markets, such as volatility and uncertainty, that investors need to consider when making decisions. Some of the new labels are associated with investment strategies that aimed to capitalized on Trump's economic and trade polices, and international relations goals. Others riff off economic implications or his abrupt U-turns as markets and trade partners react to his proposals. The "Trump Trade" that played on the Make America Great Again theme in the wake of his November election victory and January inauguration, and contributed to record highs on Wall Street in February, is hardly discussed now that stocks, the dollar and Treasury bonds have succumbed to worries about his tariff polices. "Post the election, we heard a lot about YOLO (You Only Live Once), which seemed to promote taking outsize risks in a concentrated investment theme," Art Hogan, strategist at B. Riley Wealth, said.
YOLO, is an acronym used to describe the tendency that was part of that Trump trade to chase high momentum strategies such as cryptocurrency. "While the term YOLO was popular for a period of time, it goes against all traditional advice," Hogan said. Here are of few more acronyms that have gotten play in the investment world in recent weeks: ** TACO (Trump Always Chickens Out) - This one coined by a Financial Times columnist, has been used as a way to describe Trump's to-ing and fro-ing on tariffs in the wake of his April 2 "Liberation Day" speech. When asked about TACO in a recent press conference, the president lashed out, calling the question "nasty" "Where we end up might not be too far from what he promised on the campaign trail. So, does he always chicken out? I wouldn't go as far as to say that," said Christian DiClementi, fixed income portfolio manager at AllianceBernstein. "I think that he wants to rebalance the economy without pushing it off a cliff. And we're watching that being executed in real time. I think some of the ideas are thought out and some of them change on the fly." ** MEGA (Make Europe Great Again) - Mega first coined last year to address European competitiveness, resurfaced this Spring as a way to describe the flurry of investor interest in and flows into European markets. MEGA hats, spoofing their MAGA counterparts, are easily purchased online It's been revived by investors and traders in light of the outperformance European stocks in the immediate aftermath of Trump's "Liberation Day" tariffs bombshell.
** MAGA (Make America Go Away) - While the original Trump Trade was also known as the MAGA trade, this variation cribbed the president's motto, first appearing in response to Vice President JD Vance's brief and unfruitful visit to Greenland, the autonomous territory of Denmark, which Trump has expressed interest in annexing. At least one Canadian investor says that quip is making the rounds of trading desks in Toronto and Montreal and sparking "wishful thinking" about simply boycotting U.S. investments. ** FAFO (Fuck Around and Find Out) - Although the acronym also came into being well before Trump's inauguration, it is being heard with increasing frequency in trading desk conversations. It is used to capture the financial market's volatility and chaos that Trump's policymaking process has created. Mark Spindel, chief investment officer of Potomac River Capital LLC, described the market as being caught in a "pinball machine as a result of that policymaking process." When reached for comment, White House spokesman Kush Desai said in an email "these asinine acronyms convey how unserious analysts have consistently beclowned themselves by mocking President Trump and his agenda that've already delivered multiple expectation-beating jobs and inflation reports, trillions in investment commitments, a historic UK trade agreement, and rising consumer confidence."
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Hans India
29 minutes ago
- Hans India
Europe can't show any flexibility on countering terrorism: Denmark's former Ambassador backs India's stance
Denmark, which will assume the Presidency of the Council of the European Union this year, continues to back India's Operation Sindoor and New Delhi's call for a global, united effort to combat the threat of terrorism. Speaking exclusively to IANS, Freddy Svane, the former Danish Ambassador to India, asserted that there can be no flexibility on the European side as far as countering terrorism is concerned. Lauding India's Operation Sindoor diplomatic outreach mission, the seasoned diplomat also backed calls to put Pakistan back on the grey list of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF). Excerpts: IANS: India is sending a very strong global message against terrorism with the visit of all-party delegations to various countries, one of which was also in Copenhagen till Saturday. How do you see this entire exercise? Freddy Svane: I think it's very important that the message that you are going to spread is listened to, heard and action taken on it. Therefore, I am pleased, having also served as Ambassador to India for more than 10 years, that India has on the backdrop of this really, really sad and deadly, inhumane Pahalgam incident, now stands up and speaks against terror. We all need to really move away from words towards actions. Therefore, the decision of the Government of India, of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, to send a group of parliamentarians across the globe to speak about how we jointly fight terror is so important and very well received, also here in Denmark. IANS: Do you think that India has emerged as a stronger nation during Operation Sindoor? Freddy Svane: I think so. Even now, I asked some of the visiting Indian parliamentarians here that is that a new thing? As I have never in my life experienced that India would be sending such all-party delegations across the globe to really voice its concerns about terror and the impact of terror. I was told there was some similar thing done decades back. But the fact that India is now standing up on this is important. It will give India a special role and a special place because India now stands up against terror. That's a new normal, and nobody should be in any doubt of what will happen if terror is not stopped. We are working closely together, as a world and as one big family. IANS: Pakistan, however, isn't learning from its mistakes and continues to export terror to India... Freddy Svane: I lived in India, as you all know, for 10 years, over two periods of time. We lived with terror, we felt the impact and so forth. Obviously, we all knew that Pakistan was behind them one way or another. You might argue that there are different faces in Pakistan; there's the political and the army. But, when it boils down to terror, there can't be two faces. There's only one ugly face, and we know that Pakistan has been instigating a lot of terror attacks against India. Sadly, with this incident, the time is really ripe for a conscious joint and coordinated response to terror, and thereby also calling out Pakistan. IANS: Do you think it is high time to put Pakistan back on the FATF grey list? Freddy Svane: I think so. Terror doesn't come out of the blue. It's something that has to be financed, structured and so forth. So, it's a long, concerted action that lies behind all this terror. And therefore, you need to do whatever you can globally, also regionally, to secure that we don't have financing that will flow into the streams of terror. It has to stop. Yes, Pakistan has to be put where it belongs. So, they have to be put on that list, no doubt about that. IANS: You first met Prime Minister Narendra Modi when he was the Chief Minister of Gujarat. India has grown tremendously under his leadership over the last decade or so... Freddy Svane: That's true. I have seen India growing. I have a huge passion for India, and so will be known by many. I was the first European Ambassador when I was in service, really to meet the honourable Prime Minister today. I met him back in May 2011 in Gujarat, and we had a very nice and long interaction. That, of course, grew over the years. When I came back as Ambassador from a second tenure in 2019, we continued, and we developed the Green Strategic Partnership. So, I think we have a very, very close and good relationship. I have seen India growing, becoming much more outward-looking. India has its own role. It's a country, a nation, which is really trying to define its own trajectory towards what is called 'Viksit Bharat' and I am a strong believer myself in 'Viksit Bharat', meaning that, of course, we have to work together and that's what Denmark and India have been doing. Under Prime Minister Modi's leadership, India has grown and will continue to grow, no doubt about that. We need a strong India, no doubt about that either. IANS: PM Modi has established himself as a very strong global leader over the years and has proved it yet again during Operation Sindoor... Freddy Svane: Yes, he has. In my interaction with the visiting parliamentary delegation, I also highlighted that when India had the G20 presidency, it rose as a global power by calling the Global South, and by also inviting the African Union into the G20. All that is a combination, the agenda of India and Prime Minister Modi to be a global player that will have a role to secure that the world will be a better, greener and more sustainable place for all of us in the future. Obviously, Prime Minister Modi, by his resolute action through Operation Sindoor, has really shown that India has drawn new red lines and that is the new normal. You should not really be in any doubt that India is a power that is ready, willing to act whenever it's needed. That's a new normal here, thanks to Honourable Prime Minister Narendra Modi. IANS: Do you think Operation Sindoor has boosted PM Modi's image further and added to the numerous achievements of his government in the last 11 very successful years? Freddy Svane: Of course, the fact that all party delegations are sent to various countries in various parts of the world just to speak about Operation Sindoor and the atrocities proves it. It shows that it is time now to stand up against terror and the way in which Pakistan, almost throughout its lifetime, has instigated terror attacks. India has shown that it has grown and is a global player, a very, very important player and that India can take action. You need a strong leader like Prime Minister Modi who can steer that kind of direction and make it clear that I am the man and I am the true defender of India. Therefore, his popularity, also outside of India, has grown, and there will be no person on this planet who will be in doubt of who is in charge and who is the leader of India, which is not only the most populous nation on earth but also the fourth largest economy of the world. So, Prime Minister Modi has grown and is being seen across the world as a very, very important, strong and strategic thinking leader, which is so important for all of us. A strong India, a strong Prime Minister is what we are looking for, and that is what we have got, though sadly on a very bad backdrop of this deadly Pahalgam incident. But when times are bad and things have to be dealt with, you also need someone who can move from words to actions. That has happened, and it is really fantastic. IANS: Do you see European countries on the same page as far as countering state-sponsored terrorism is concerned? Freddy Svane: This is a tricky question. I think, at least nowadays, and given whatever happened in India and given the atrocities and inhuman behaviour, there can be no flexibility on the European side as to how we have to fight terror. Terror is a global menace that we have to really fight, and whatever tool we have, we should deploy. I do hope that, with this tour of Indian parliamentary groups, there is a common understanding and a kind of awareness that we have to move away from words to actions. Of course, I will be following a little bit closely what will come out of all these visits to various countries - will there be more coordinated, more joint efforts to fight terror, or will we just see another range of words and no actions? I think the answer lies very much in the way in which India will take these visits and say we have sent all party delegations to these countries, important countries across the globe, and now there is a common sense that we have to do and deal with terror and let's propose some actions. So, I hope that India will come up with that kind of action programme, saying this is what we need to do, and hopefully, countries not just in Europe but also other places on this planet will join in and say terror is a global menace and we have to fight it. Terror will happen as long as we are not united. Now we seem to be united, thanks to India and Prime Minister Modi. IANS: Pakistan is left with very few 'all-weather friends', is it not high time that these countries too realise that they are backing a terror state? Freddy Svane: Yeah, but I'm not surprised that some countries have placed themselves in that camp. I think we all have to get together and find and define the common position because terror, regardless of how we define what terror is, and what kind of components will go into terror, cannot be in any country, any population, or any people's interests to face the menace of terror. Therefore, we have to stand together. I hope that the diplomatic outreach will at least secure that more and more countries will join the camp of India and say, enough is enough. Let's now move from words, diplomatically framed words, to actions. Therefore, as I said, I hope, as a former Ambassador to India, that India and Prime Minister Modi will stand up and say this is the catalogue of actions we need to take. IANS: What was your first reaction on hearing about the extradition of 2008 Mumbai terror attack accused Tahawwur Rana to India, who was also prosecuted for providing material support for a terror attack in Denmark? Freddy Svane: I was so relieved. I think it shows that justice will prevail at some point in time, and those who are committing terror and terror-related activities will be brought to justice. There should be no safe haven for terrorists. When I saw the extradition of Rana to India, I felt relieved because India has been pushing for that for many, many years, and finally, the extradition happened. I do hope that it sends a very strong message across that you can't hide, use whatever kind of institutional tool that you might access to prevent yourself from being brought to justice. So, it was a great, great, great achievement, I will say! IANS: Denmark is also the only country in the world with which India has a Green Strategic Partnership. How do you see this bilateral relationship progressing? Freddy Svane: I don't see any limits to it. If I may say so. It all started with my first meeting with the honourable Chief Minister, now Prime Minister, back in May 2011 in Gujarat. The two of us discussed how we could work together at that time. I was the Danish Ambassador, but we had a kind of shared vision, a mission to move towards a greener and sustainable development. In that context, we developed this kind of idea. We had, in fact, in 2012-13 held a number of seminars, workshops in Gujarat's Gandhinagar, where we put focus on renewables, wind, water and so forth. I see there's a direct line between this and the fact that we have this green strategic partnership, I think it combines -- as honourable Prime Minister has said many times -- it combines the skills of India and the skills of Denmark. India has a lot of skills. I went to Khavda, the Adani big project, last year. I was so blown away by the magnitude and the kind of strategy aligned behind it. It was an eye-opener, and it shows that the green transition, green strategic cooperation, whatever we call it, is so important. It's not only good for bilateral relations but a must for all of us. We need to secure that we have a better and more sustainable world so that we can look into the future. Our next generations will be suffering if we don't crack this climate crisis. Therefore, I was so pleased when honourable Prime Minister Modi came to Denmark, and we could really take the green strategic partnership forward, which is so important. I do hope that it will also inspire others because what can be done bilaterally is not enough. It calls for a kind of global action, like the fight against terror.
Time of India
an hour ago
- Time of India
US stock market outlook: Will S&P 500, Dow Jones, Nasdaq witness another best month?
US stock market will look to start the month of June in positive manner after Wall Street registered its best month since 2023. All eyes are on S&P 500, Dow Jones, and Nasdaq. S&P 500 finished the day nearly unchanged after edging down by less than 0.1 per cent. The Dow Jones Industrial Average added 54 points, or 0.1 per cent, and the Nasdaq composite slipped 0.3 per cent. S&P 500 edged down 0.48 to 5,911.69 points. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 54.34 to 42,270.07, and the Nasdaq composite slipped 62.11 to 19,113.77. Wall Street have been dominated by questions about what will happen with Trump's tariffs, which investors worry could grind the economy into a recession, slash companies' profits and layer even more challenges on households already sick of inflation. Hopes had largely been rising that the worst of such worries had passed, which in turn sent stocks rallying, after Trump paused his tariffs on both China and the European Union. A U.S. court then on Wednesday blocked many of Trump's sweeping tariffs. It all sent the S&P 500 in May to its first winning month in four and its best since November. But the tariffs remain in place for now while the White House appeals the ruling by the U.S. Court of International Trade, and the ultimate outcome is still uncertain. FAQs Live Events Q1. What are key indexes of US Stock Market? A1. US Stock Market's key indexes are -- S&P 500, Dow Jones, and Nasdaq. Q2. How are US Stock Market indexes performing? A2. S&P 500 finished the day nearly unchanged after edging down by less than 0.1 per cent. The Dow Jones Industrial Average added 54 points, or 0.1 per cent, and the Nasdaq composite slipped 0.3 per cent. S&P 500 edged down 0.48 to 5,911.69 points. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 54.34 to 42,270.07, and the Nasdaq composite slipped 62.11 to 19,113.77.
Mint
an hour ago
- Mint
Resource war: How commercial assets turned into front line weaponry
Chennai: Recently, J.D. Vance, the US vice president, confirmed what the world feared. He termed the competition between the US and China in developing artificial intelligence (AI) as an 'arms race'. Policy makers in both the countries believe that whoever wins this race will dominate the world, going forward. At the core of this battle is computing power and this has given a fresh impetus to the chip war that began between the US and China five years ago. In May 2020, during his first term as the president of the US, Donald Trump fired the first salvo. The US commerce department added Chinese tech giant Huawei Technologies to the 'Entity List', a measure which prevented the company that sells smartphones, telecom equipment and cloud computing services from accessing advanced computer chips produced or developed using US technology or software. The reason? The US feared that Huawei's attractively priced products, backed by Chinese government subsidy, would soon dominate the next generation telecom networks, ending American clout in the field. The move had a debilitating impact on Huawei. Its global expansion took a hit and revenue crashed. 'A corporate giant faced technological asphyxiation," Chris Miller, in his book Chip War, wrote. According to him, this development reminded China of its weakness. 'In nearly every step of the process of producing semiconductors, China is staggeringly dependent on foreign technology, almost all of which is controlled by its geopolitical rivals—Taiwan, Japan, South Korea or the US," he wrote. China began investing billions of dollars to develop its own semiconductor technology in a bid to free itself from America's chip choke, he added. But the US is in no mood to make this endeavour easy for China. It has progressively tightened restrictions on China's semiconductor sector. The 'Entity List' has since grown to include over 140 Chinese companies—fabrication units, semiconductor tool companies and even investment companies that operate in the sector. Restrictions have extended from chips with high bandwidth memory to semiconductor manufacturing equipment and software tools. China, which sees US restrictions as an attempt to deny it the technological greatness it deserves, has retaliated. It began imposing restrictions on export of critical and rare earth minerals that are crucial for production of weapons, semiconductors and electric vehicles. There are 17 rare earth minerals and China has absolute control on most of them (see chart). In October 2023, it introduced export permits for graphite needed to produce lithium ion batteries. In December that year, it banned transfer of rare earth minerals extraction and separation technologies and the technology to make magnets. China, over the years, has mastered these technologies. In the same month, it banned the export of antimony, gallium and germanium apart from imposing stricter review of graphite exports to the US. In February 2025, in response to Donald Trump imposing 10% tariffs on all Chinese products, the middle kingdom added five more critical minerals— tungsten, indium, bismuth, tellurium and molybdenum to the export control list. This meant that companies require special export licenses to export the minerals. On 4 April, after Trump's Liberation Day tariffs, China further added seven more minerals and magnets to the export restrictions list. There is no clarity whether these restrictions have been suspended after the recent US and China trade talks in Geneva. The US is now scrambling to find alternate sources for these minerals. All of a sudden, economic resources which were till recently seen predominantly as commercial assets, have acquired new edge as strategic instruments. They are no longer controlled just by the market— geopolitics has a greater say over them. A short history Demand for resources began to rise after the Industrial Revolution in 1760 which introduced the use of metals such as iron and steel. The rise of mechanized factory systems increased output and thus, demand for resources. As the demand rose, countries such as Great Britain, France and Belgium began colonizing the world in search of resources. 'Colonization was all about exploitation of natural resources," said S. Gurumurthy, writer and a corporate advisor. The British empire met its demand for cotton, tea, leather, coal and iron ore from India for almost two centuries, he added. Post World War II, resources were seen as market instruments. They were freely traded for a price. According to the World Trade Organization, between 1950 and 2024, global trade volumes grew by 4,500%. 'It was also a period when countries used trade to increase co-dependence in the hope that it would enhance peace and welfare," Dhruva Jaishankar, executive director, Observer Research Foundation — America, said. Europe bought gas from Russia in the hope that the latter would leave them alone. The US built a strong economic relationship with China on the assumption that the Asian nation could integrate with the global economy, eliminate poverty, and embrace democratic principles. Of course, trade in resources has not been entirely free. Nations have imposed restrictions. In the last 75 years, the US is the biggest culprit. As a sole super power, it denied various countries technology and resources that it deemed were dual use—for both civil and military applications. As the US-China rivalry intensifies, the weaponization is spilling beyond dual use technologies. China, it appears, is not loath to leveraging the domination it has built in the global economy. The new normal China accounts for more than 30% of global manufacturing output. This is the highest concentration of manufacturing in one place," said Jaishankar. The US had a similar share for a short period of time immediately after World War II when the protracted war had destroyed much of production facilities in mainland Europe and Japan. 'China has managed to achieve this without a war," he said, adding 'it is now trying to use its manufacturing power as a strategic leverage." It is not just manufacturing. Consider China's domination in the shipping space. It controls over 100 ports across 63 nations. As of 2022, it had 96% share in container production, 48% of global ship building orders and 80% of ship-to-shore cranes. It has similar domination across many sectors. 'What is worrying is that China has revealed its intention to weaponize goods, logistics or the entire supply chain," said an Indian government official who did not want to be identified. There is a conscious attempt by China to make the world depend on it. Simultaneously, it is reducing its dependence on the world. The restriction on export of rare earth minerals is just a beginning, he added. The resentment For more than four decades, China had silently focused on growing its economy. It eased rules to attract manufacturing taking advantage of its low wage costs. It invested in infrastructure—power, roads, ports and airports. It enabled building factories at unheard of scale which substantially reduced the cost of production. Global brands rushed to China to take advantage of it. Until a few years ago, 85% of all iPhone produced by Apple were assembled in China. At one point in time, almost all of Nike's shoes were produced in China. There were warnings within the US about this excessive dependence. Michael Pillsbury's book, The Hundred-Year Marathon, detailed China's secret desire to upstage the US as a global superpower. He, indeed many others, pointed out that China harboured a deep resentment and a sense of injury for losing its status as a middle kingdom when it dominated the world—economically, culturally and militarily. In the early 1700s, China (and India) had a large share of the world economy. On the eve of the Industrial Revolution, in 1760, it accounted for a third of the global economy. In the two centuries that followed, it lost out significantly. By 1979, China's share of the global economy was just 2%. Chinese consider the period between 1839 and 1945 a 'century of humiliation' that saw political fragmentation, decline and subjugation by foreign powers such as Russia, Japan and the West. The Chinese yearned to regain this lost glory. Today, China has 19% share in the global GDP, fast catching up with the US' 27%. Late wakeup call Policy makers in the US, for years, took a benign view of China's growth. Pillsbury pointed out that they saw their China policy as a commercial win and ignored the strategic dimension. Only when China began to assert itself, did they realise the depth of US' dependence on China and its real motive. It is not a surprise that Pillsbury, as Trump's advisor, is the architect of US' China policy now. Today, the US and China are engaged in a contest. The US is playing to its strength by denying advanced technology to China. By focusing on the massive $295 trade deficit (in 2024) and imposing massive tariffs, the Trump administration wants to reduce its dependence. China, for its part, is thinking long term to upstage the US. Lizzi Lee, a fellow at the Asia Society Policy Institute's Centre for China Analysis, best described its strategy in a recent Financial Times article. He wrote: 'Xi is not looking to win the trade war in a conventional sense. He's positioning China for a drawn-out, grinding, contest by building domestic capacity, hardening supply chain and rooting out perceived vulnerabilities to foreign pressure." India play As the US and China fight for supremacy, India needs to have a strategy to deal with the fallout. 'Countries, be it China or the US, have exclusive rights over their resources. Weaponizing such resources is the new normal," said Ajay Srivastava, founder, Global Trade Research Initiative, a trade focussed think tank. India needs to put in place policies to minimise the impact of such decisions. India should identify and develop resources that the world would need and use it as a bargaining chip, he added. 'India may lack such resources now but we need to identify those and invest now," Gurumurthy added. China, Jaishankar said, does not have all the resources within its nation. It had worked assiduously to tap these critical minerals across the world, especially from African nations. China's strength, he added, is in developing the ability to process them in an effective manner. 'India needs to follow a similar strategy. We should strike deals with nations which have these resources and import the mineral for processing in India. That will give us control over it," he explained. India has already drawn up a list of critical minerals and has taken steps to secure them. It is part of the Mineral Security Partnership, a multi-nation initiative led by the US comprising 40 countries. It has struck, or is close to striking, a few deals in Latin America and Africa. But processing the minerals is easier said than done. It is capital intensive and requires a long lead time. Investors don't support such projects unless there is a strong business case. Experts have also suggested that India should frame policies to suit its strengths. Some have questioned pushing electrification of vehicles in a big way. With India lacking the raw material to make batteries, the rise in electric vehicles will shift India's energy dependence from West Asia to China. Others have recommended that India should invest heavily in taking a lead in green hydrogen. India is blessed with abundant sunlight and focus on storage systems can help it use solar power to drive green hydrogen efforts. India's efforts, such as production-linked incentives, have cut its dependence on China for solar cells and modules. More needs to be done if India has to become self-sufficient. To make all this possible, the country, particularly its private sector, would need to invest in research and development. If there is one thing that can come in India's way is its hubris, warned experts. 'What is needed is a long term vision and a step-by-step approach to achieve it," GTRI's Srivastava said.
