CNBC Daily Open: Trump shows no mercy with his tariffs — and stocks suffer

Psychologist Carl Jung believed in the “collective unconscious,” a universal mind all humanity is tapped into. In the context of the financial world, the stock market — as something ostensibly based on concrete numbers, but most of the time driven by instinctive hopes and fears — kind of works like that.

It is, in other words, essentially a tracker of sentiment. Nowhere is this function clearer than the discrepancy between stocks’ moves during regular trading hours (modest climbs), prior to U.S. President Donald Trump’s triumphant unveiling of his tariff plan, and extended trading (precipitous plunges), when investors had time to digest — and suffer indigestion from — the sheer weight of the White House’s heavy tariffs on countries across the globe.

Trump teased leniency on tariffs days before revealing his cards. That quality of mercy was nowhere to be seen — the tariffs appear sweeping and severe. To call Trump’s tariff plan a seismic shift in the economic and financial world order might be an understatement. It could take time for price changes to filter into the economy. But the stock market, as the collective unconscious of investors, could register this shock in the coming days.

Tariffs for all
U.S. President Donald Trump announced Wednesday sweeping tariffs on more than 180 countries and territories. The plan imposes a 20% levy on the European Union, 46% on Vietnam, 32% on Taiwan and 34% on China — which comes on top of the 20% already existing — making the total tariff on Beijing 54%. There will also be a 10% baseline tariff on all U.S. imports. Get updates on ongoing tariff developments on CNBC’s live blog.

Manufacturing in Vietnam threatened
For years, Vietnam was a popular alternative for companies, such as footwear brands and furniture manufacturers, trying to avoid the crossfire of U.S. trade tensions with China. But Trump’s planned 46% tariff on Vietnam will change the picture. Shares of Nike, Steven Madden and American Eagle slumped in extended trading after Trump’s announcement. The question now is whether— and where — those firms could move their manufacturing.

Tech stocks slump
Apple shares sank more than 6% in late trading Wednesday and led a broader decline in tech stocks after Trump’s tariff announcement. Apple manufactures most devices in China. Nvidia, which produces new chips in Taiwan, fell about 5.7%. U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Wednesday the sell-off in the stock market is due more to a sharp pullback in the biggest technology stocks instead of White House trade policies.

U.S. stock futures crater
U.S. stock futures plunged in extended trading Wednesday after Trump unveiled extensive tariffs. As of publication time, futures tied to the Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 1.9%, S&P 500 futures tumbled 2.8% and Nasdaq-100 futures slumped 3.5%. Shares of multinational companies fell in extended trading. During regular trading earlier in the day, all three major indexes closed higher. The pan-European Stoxx 600 index was down 0.5%.

Tesla disappoints on deliveries
Tesla on Wednesday reported 336,681 vehicle deliveries in the first quarter of 2025. That’s a 13% decline from a year ago, and is below the 360,000 and 370,000 deliveries expected by investors, according to StreetAccount. However, shares of the company rose 5.3% on reports that CEO Elon Musk would leave his role at the so-called Department of Government Efficiency in the coming months — though Musk discredited that idea.

[PRO] ‘Worse than the worst case scenario’
Trump’s extensive tariffs rollout on Wednesday was “worse than the worst case scenario,” Dan Ives, global head of technology research at Wedbush Securities, wrote in a Wednesday note following the White House announcement. Here are the stocks that Ives will be keeping an eye on because of heavy import levies.

Amazon submits bid for TikTok as ban deadline nears

Amazon sent a bid to the White House to purchase the social media app TikTok from its Chinese owners, according to a source familiar with the matter who asked not to be named because the discussions are confidential. The parties are not treating the bid seriously, however, given that it was submitted just days before a deadline staving off a U.S. ban is set to expire, the person said.

The e-commerce company’s offer, which was first reported by The New York Times, comes as TikTok’s fate in the U.S. is up in the air. The short-form video app faces another potential shutdown in the U.S. on April 5 if ByteDance, its parent company, cannot reach a deal to divest TikTok’s American operations.