RTX fell 1.2 per cent after cutting its forecast for profit in 2025 but also raising its forecast for revenue. It made the changes to incorporate what CEO Chris Calio called “our current assessment of the impact of tariffs,” along with other changes anticipated from Washington’s recent approval of big tax changes.
Coca-Cola slipped 0.7 per cent even though it delivered a stronger profit than forecast. Its revenue for the quarter only edged past analysts’ expectations, and it said that higher prices that it charged helped offset sales of fewer cases during the spring. The company also said it’s launching a new Coke product for American consumers made with US cane sugar this year.
Tuesday’s announcement came less than a week after President Donald Trump said in a Truth Social post that the company agreed to use cane sugar in its US Coke beverages. On a call with analysts, chief executive officer James Quincey thanked the president for his “enthusiasm for our Coca-Cola brand.”
Trump has labelled Fed chief Jerome Powell a “numbskull”.Credit: AP
Opendoor Technologies, a company that’s caught interest among investors looking for the next “meme stock” that could rise regardless of how its profits are doing, lost momentum and dropped 10.7 per cent to $US2.86. It had climbed as high as $US3.99 in the morning, more than quintuple its price of 78 cents from just two Fridays ago.
In the bond market, Treasury yields sank as traders continue to expect the Federal Reserve to wait until September at the earliest to resume cutting interest rates.
Fed Chair Jerome Powell has been insisting he wants to see more data about how Trump’s tariffs are affecting inflation and the economy before the Fed makes its next move. That’s despite often angry criticism from Trump, who has been lobbying for more cuts to rates to happen sooner.
Powell is a “numbskull” who has kept interest rates too high, but he will be out in eight months, Trump said at a news conference on Tuesday.
“I think he’s done a bad job, but he’s going to be out pretty soon anyway. In eight months, he’ll be out,” he said from a meeting at the White House with Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.
Powell’s term as Fed chair runs through May 15, and he has repeatedly said he will not leave the post early. Eight months would mean Powell would remain in place until mid-March; it was not immediately clear why Trump picked that time frame.
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The yield on the 10-year Treasury eased to 4.33 per cent from 4.38 per cent late Monday.
In overseas markets, Japan’s benchmark surged and then fell back as it reopened from a holiday Monday following the ruling coalition’s loss of its upper house majority in Sunday’s election. The Nikkei 225 shed 0.1 per cent.
Analysts said the market initially climbed on relief that Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba vowed to stay in office despite a loss for his ruling coalition in an upper-house election Sunday. But the results have only added to political uncertainty and left his government without the heft needed to push through legislation.
A breakthrough in trade talks with the US might win Ishiba a reprieve, but so far there’s been scant sign of progress in negotiating away the threat of higher tariffs on Japan’s exports to the US beginning August 1.