Corporate America is living through two vastly different experiences of President Trump's tariff summer.
More than 100 of the largest U.S. companies reported quarterly financial results in the last week, updating investors about how much money they earned (or lost) and what they're expecting for the rest of the year. These updates provide a regular window into how CEOs and other business leaders feel not just about their companies but also about the broader economy.
Now, with another White House deadline looming next week for tariff deals with other countries — and plenty of uncertainty remaining over what these taxes will ultimately cost businesses and consumers — this month's earnings reports have been closely watched.
And they've varied wildly. Some big companies, especially carmakers and other consumer-facing businesses, are reporting real financial pain from the tariffs that Trump has imposed so far. But for many of the tech and financial companies that are less reliant on imports, it has been a pretty great few months.
"There's a large divergence in experiences among firms — some of whom are very exposed to import prices and some of whom really aren't," says Laura Veldkamp, a professor of finance and economics at Columbia Business School.
Investors seem to be focusing on the good news: The benchmark S&P 500 and the tech-heavy Nasdaq hit a series of record highs this week. (The Dow Jones Industrial Average, which is made up of many fewer companies, was tempered in part by bad news and share sell-offs at UnitedHealth Group. But it also rose more than 500 points, or almost 1.3%, this week.)
Here are three takeaways from what CEOs and their companies are saying about the economy this month.
1. They're kind of tired of talking about tariffs
CEOs and other business leaders have spent months trying to figure out how to criticize Trump's policies without drawing his ire. And in April, days after the president first unveiled his sweeping new tariffs, some of the United States' most powerful executives used their earnings reports and other public appearances to warn about the potential damage these taxes could cause.
Since then, Trump has delayed or softened some of his proposed tariffs, although plenty of uncertainty about their final shape remains. And business leaders have continued cycling through the five stages of tariff grief.
But now some big companies are trying, as much as possible, to look beyond the trade elephant in the room.
"The corporate community has … sort of accepted that they just need to navigate through this and are kind of getting on with it," JPMorganChase's chief financial officer, Jeremy Barnum, told journalists during a conference call last week.
However, he acknowledged, "it's still challenging for many individual firms."
2. Not all big businesses are feeling the same effects
Carmaker General Motors said this week that tariffs cost it more than $1 billion in the past three months, joining a chorus of hurting automakers — though GM still posted a profit.
Meanwhile, restaurant chain Chipotle said customers are worried about the economy and buying fewer burritos, while the company braces to pay more for its ingredients.
But not all consumer-facing companies were weighed down by the same problems. For example, Coca-Cola and toy maker Hasbro both posted better-than-expected results.
Over in Silicon Valley, Google did so well that it's throwing another $10 billion at its artificial intelligence efforts. And on Wall Street, big banks surfed this spring's market volatility to a terrific quarter.
Columbia Business School's Veldkamp points out that retailers and other sellers of material goods are usually the first companies to feel the impact of tariffs — because, after all, they have to import the avocados or toys or components of the physical goods that they sell.
Some companies, including Walmart, have said they will pass along some increased prices to consumers; others say they're trying to avoid doing so (or at least have avoided announcing it so far).
"Those firms might try to absorb some of those tariffs for a while, especially because the tariffs themselves are uncertain," Veldkamp adds.
But if eventually companies "can't make a profit selling what it is that they're selling at the prices they had been selling at it, we'll see them pass those increases in prices on to consumers," she adds.
Which means …
3. We're still months away, at least, from seeing the final impact of tariffs
There are signs that consumers are already feeling some pain from tariffs. Government data released last week shows that inflation picked up in June.
But there are still plenty of unknown unknowns. Next Friday, Aug. 1, marks the latest deadline Trump has set for imposing sky-high import taxes on a large list of countries. That deadline was pushed back from earlier this month.
However long the United States takes to finalize its new tariff rates, businesses won't have clarity on their new costs until then. And then it'll take even more time for those costs, and how companies decide to handle them, to trickle down to consumers — and the overall U.S. economy.
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