Is Donald Trump’s bark already losing its bite? After the president (via a Wednesday morning tweet) blasted Nordstrom for dropping his daughter Ivanka’s clothing line, shares of the retail giant momentarily shuddered, then, surprisingly, rallied, finishing the day up more than 4%. The performance snapped a streak of public companies sustaining damage to their stock after Trump singled them out.
There was even some anecdotal evidence that Trump’s tweet had backfired, with investors buying shares in protest. “He did not hurt the stock. I will leave it to you to take it beyond that,” says Richard Jaffe, an analyst at Stifel Nicolaus who covers the company.
Shortly after Trump’s Nordstrom tweet, he appeared in the Oval Office with Intel CEO Brian Krzanich at his elbow. The chief of the U.S.-based tech giant announced a $7 billion chip investment to finish building a semiconductor factory in Arizona, crediting Trump’s tax and regulatory proposals with compelling the decision. As Fortune editor Alan Murray lays out this morning, Intel has some amends to make with Trump after Krzanich canceled a fundraiser for him over the summer. And, within the last week, the company added its name to the tech industry-driven legal brief opposing Trump’s travel ban.
But Intel watchers say the company had already planned the project and would have followed through anyway. Meanwhile, a number of other manufacturers Trump has named and shamed for moving production abroad are nevertheless plowing ahead, per a Wall Street Journal report today. Rexnord, which Trump targeted in a December tweet for “viciously firing” workers in an Indianapolis plant making industrial bearings, is still moving the facility to Mexico. And Caterpillar and Nucor, both led by CEOs advising Trump on manufacturing policy, likewise are shifting production to plants south of the border.
We’ll be watching today to see if any Trump pronouncements following his meeting with airline executives manage to move their stocks — or if Nordstrom’s example suggests a new immunity is taking hold in the markets.
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