Weekly Market Update

The House of Representatives handed President Donald Trump a major victory by passing its One Big, Beautiful Bill Act early Thursday morning. The legislation contains a slew of tax breaks for individuals, a bigger SALT tax deduction, Medicaid cuts, and immigration spending measures—but no Social Security tax cuts, a Trump campaign promise.

The legislation will now move to the Senate, where changes are highly likely. The Republican-led majority aims to pass the legislation this summer and hand it to Trump to sign into law.

The bond market may also have a say: Tax provisions in the bill would increase the federal deficit by $3.8 trillion from 2026 to 2034, according to a preliminary analysis Tuesday night
by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office. Long-term bond yields are rising on the prospect of the U.S. government issuing trillions of dollars in additional debt to finance the GOP’s tax and spending plans. The “bond vigilantes,” as they’re known, may exert pressure on Congress to pare back the cost.

On Wednesday, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman announced that his company is acquiring io, a start-up led by Jony Ive, Apple’s former chief designer. The merger unites the premier AI company with a hardware team assembled by one of the world’s premier designers. The goal? To make a new device for the AI era.

The merger quickly led to talk about the end of smartphones, but it may be worth considering the history. Well-funded and big-name partnerships often end in failure. And, with a few exceptions, ex-Apple employees don’t have a great record of success after leaving the company.

The Federal Reserve is unique among government agencies, the Supreme Court ruled Thursday. While the ruling doesn’t explicitly prevent President Donald Trump from firing Fed Chair Jerome Powell or any other member of the central bank, it does provide some relief for those worried about Fed independence.

The court’s ruling focused on cases involving leaders of independent agencies whom Trump had removed from office. Those officers may be removed pending a full hearing of the case, the court ruled.

Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta President Raphael Bostic said Tuesday that uncertainty stemming from trade policy, foreign investors retreating from U.S. markets, and the possibility of tax cuts could force the central bank to delay cutting interest rates, even if policymakers are eager to move eventually.

Speaking to reporters at the Atlanta Fed’s Financial Markets Conference on Amelia Island, Fla., Bostic said he is comfortable with the Fed’s current wait-and-see stance. But recent developments are clouding the timeline for easing.

Nvidia is taking a significant step toward opening its platform, allowing customers to bring their own CPU or AI chip. It offers the option for future Nvidia racks with, say, Nvidia and Qualcomm chips inside.

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang announced the move on Monday at the COMPUTEX trade show in Taiwan. The new system is called NVLink Fusion.

The Trump administration said late on Monday that a major New York offshore wind project can move ahead, a month after the administration inexplicably stopped it.

The White House implied that it had made a side deal with New York Gov. Kathy Hochul to allow a natural gas pipeline into the state in return for the wind farm being built. But Trump’s pipeline project remains a long shot, and Hochul’s office says she made no deal with the president to approve it.

AT&T has agreed to acquire substantially all of Lumen’s residential fiber broadband network for about $5.75 billion in an all-cash deal.

Lumen’s Mass Markets fiber business includes about one million fiber customers, including residential and business customers, and reaches more than four million fiber locations across 11 states. Lumen’s subscribers will transition into AT&T customers over time.

General Motors is an electric-vehicle advocate, but even it’s worried about California’s aggressive EV mandate.

The battle over EV regulations is only beginning. The Wall Street Journal reported Sunday that GM was pushing to eliminate or modify California’s EV targets, citing a memo sent to employees.

The Food and Drug Administration will only apply its existing process for updating Covid-19 shots for older adults and those at a high risk of severe illness, the agency’s head wrote in a medical journal article on Tuesday.

To get new Covid-19 shots approved for younger, healthy adults, drugmakers will need to run new randomized clinical trials, FDA Commissioner Dr. Marty Makary wrote.

Home Depot missed earnings expectations for the first time in five years, but reiterated guidance and assertions it won’t be raising prices in response to higher tariffs.

Importantly, the company plans to keep prices unchanged despite the new levies. More than 50% of Home Depot’s purchases are sourced in the U.S., executives said on an earnings call Tuesday.