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The U.S. stock market completed a roller-coaster first half of the year at record-high levels, but a host of factors could knock equities off their perch over the rest of 2025. The benchmark S&P 500 is up over 5% on the year so far, rebounding from an April plunge after an economic scare stemming from President Donald Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariff plan. Here are some of the key questions facing U.S. stock investors at the start of the second half. WILL TARIFFS BITE, OR JUST BARK? While worst-case fears about Trump’s tariffs have eased, more near-term volatility could be in store as the U.S. seeks to hammer out trade agreements in the coming weeks. A July 9 deadline on many tariffs, if it holds, could be an early second-half test for stocks. Even if some of the harshest levies are rolled back, higher effective tariffs this year still could drive up inflation and cut into company profits and consumer spending. The effective U.S. tariff rate based on announced policies has climbed to 13% from 3% at the start of the year, Goldman Sachs analysts said last week. After strong first-quarter profits, U.S. corporate earnings will be a critical gauge to assess whether Wall Street has properly factored in the fallout from tariffs. Second-quarter reports begin later this month, with S&P 500 earnings in the period expected to have increased 5.9%, according to LSEG IBES. WHEN WILL THE FED CUT RATES? Fed Chair Jerome Powell has pointed to concerns that tariffs will push up inflation as a reason for the central bank to hold off on interest rate cuts. Still, fed fund futures indicate nearly three cuts expected by the end of this year, with the first likely in September, LSEG data showed. The Fed and Powell have endured a barrage of pressure from Trump to cut rates and the president has mused about picking a replacement for Powell soon, well ahead of the expiration of the chair’s term in May 2026. That move could increase expectations for more cuts but also bring turbulence to markets concerned about the Fed remaining independent. A weakening U.S. economy could also prompt the central bank to ease rates, and some signs of softening in the labor market mean that incoming data poses a test for asset prices. The latest monthly employment report is due on Thursday. IS BIG TECH BACK IN CHARGE? After a rough start to the year, technology and growth shares have retaken the reins of the market. Tech was the best-performing S&P 500 sector in the second quarter, while the “Magnificent Seven” megacap stocks overall have surged since the market’s April lows. The performance has revived concerns about a relatively small number of large stocks propelling the market, including that the advance may not be as strong beneath the surface. Many investors still expect more stocks to support market gains as the year goes on. The equal-weight version of the S&P 500which better captures performance of the average stock in the indexis up nearly 4% in 2025. “I would suspect that if the market is going to continue pushing higher, you’re going to need to see broadening,” said Brent Schutte, chief investment officer at Northwestern Mutual Wealth Management. HOW EXPENSIVE CAN EQUITIES GET? With the market’s rebound, stock valuations have also ascended. On Friday, when the S&P 500 hit its first record high in over four months, the index’s forward price-to-earnings ratio reached 22.2. That was the highest level since February and well above its long-term average of 15.8. As investors seek to value equities, they are increasingly looking to future earnings prospects, including whether 2026 profits significantly improve. S&P 500 earnings are expected to rise 8.5% this year and 14% next year. Another factor is Treasury yields, which tend to pressure equity valuations when they rise. While benchmark yields have subsided since earlier this year, any spike in the 10-year yield could rattle stock investors, such as if the U.S. fiscal bill moving through Congress prompts concerns about the widening deficit. WILL ‘U.S. EXCEPTIONALISM’ DOUBTS DENT EQUITIES? Questions about the allure of U.S. assets have been a global theme in 2025, triggered by Trump’s stunning tariffs announcement in April that sparked uncertainty over American policy. The U.S. dollar recently hit its lowest level in three years against a basket of major currencies. After a long period of dominance over other regions, U.S. equities have also trailed their international counterparts so far this year. Non-U.S. equities are still relatively cheap in general, creating questions about which group will win out over the rest of 2025. WILL GEOPOLITICS RE-EMERGE AS A RISK? Stocks pulled back briefly during the recent Israel-Iran conflict before tensions calmed, but analysts are wary that resumption of Middle East hostilities could cause fresh volatility. That would particularly be the case if constraints on oil supply led crude prices to soar above $100 a barrel. Spikes in geopolitical unrest over the past 30 years have rarely been a headwind for U.S. equity returns, Barclays strategists said in a recent note. But they added that “geopolitical risk flare-ups do motivate bouts of elevated volatility, and risk assets in general would be vulnerable should the current conflict escalate.” Lewis Krauskopf, Reuters
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Theres a famous satirical article from The Onion whose headline reads, Heartbreaking: The Worst Person You Know Just Made a Great Point. The face of the man featured in that article has since become social media shorthand for agreeing with a person one finds otherwise despicableand its popped up quite a lot lately in Bluesky posts about the far-right pundit and former Fox News host Tucker Carlson. After U.S. ally Israel attacked Iran on June 13, and President Trump teased the possibility of intervening on Israels behalf, Carlson pivoted away from his usual support for the president. Rather than maintain MAGA orthodoxy around the urgent need to aid Israel’s militarily, hes been staunchly critical of Trumps willingness to lead the United States into warleaving Carlsons critics in the rare position of giving him some credit. In fact, viral clips from the podcasters recent interviews offer a fascinating glimpse of how Fox News might look if it werent pot-committed to MAGA. That glimpse, however, is likely just a mirage. @tuckercarlson Ted Cruz on Iran. Full interview tomorrow. Watch the full interview now on TuckerCarlson.com original sound – Tucker Carlson Although Carlson had already turned headsincluding Trumpswith his verbal aversion to attacking Iran, the MAGA split truly began during a June 18 interview with Republican Senator Ted Cruz of Texas. The host of The Tucker Carlson Show surprised his guest with a series of combative questions, demonstrating Cruzs unfamiliarity with the region, before giving him the third degree over his unconditional support of Israel. A bipartisan coalition of social media users ended up embracing the interview, united by their distaste of war, Cruz, or both. Indeed, just the clip of Carlson seemingly aghast that the senator does not know the population of the country [he] seek[s] to topple has been viewed 18 million times on TikTok alone. Room for agreement? If Carlson seemed opposed to a hypothetical U.S. attack on Iran before one actually materialized, he did not moderate his position afterward. On the June 27 episode, just a week after Trumps bombing strike against three nuclear facilities in the region, Carlson released an interview with controversial Republican Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, unpacking the attack. Considering that Carlson has given a platform to Holocaust revisionists as recently as last fall, and that Greene herself came under fire in 2021 for previously using anti-Semitic tropes, both the host and guest came across measured and reasonable in their criticism of the Israeli government, and what Trump appears willing to do on its behalf. At one point, speaking about embattled Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Carlson noted, Hes way more popular in Congress than he is in Israel, and applauded Greene for standing apart from her peers in their support for the leader. @onpoint2025 Israel & US Aid: Addressing War & Taxpayer Concerns We discuss critical perspectives on the ongoing conflict involving Israel, including criticisms of Netanyahu’s leadership and concerns about American aid. We explore arguments against using taxpayer dollars abroad when domestic needs persist. This is not about identity politics, it’s about focusing on Americans. #IsraelPalestine #USForeignPolicy #Netanyahu #TaxpayerMoney #AmericanAid #WarDebate #PoliticalCommentary #DomesticPriorities #AmericanPolitics #USGovernment original sound – onpoint According to a recent CNN poll, 88% of Democrats disapprove of Trumps strikes against Iran while 82% of Republicans are in favor of the decision. Its easy to imagine many of those Democrats agreeing with Carlson on this topic. Has the former Fox News all-star truly broken up with MAGA? Could Carlson become the long-fabled Joe Rogan of the Left? Dont count on it. Taking the recent viral clips alone as evidence of a purported pivot is like looking at a puzzle through a keyhole. It ignores everything else the pundit has said recently. Need we be reminded that this is the same person who mainstreamed Great Replacement Theory in American discourse, demanded that Dr. Anthony Fauci be prosecuted for supposed COVID crimes, and believes he was once attacked by demons? Sure, it may be tempting to praise his condemnation of war-crazed Republican senators, but not when he also suggests that a huge percentage of them are secretly gay. (as if being gay were either a character defect or something that historically connotes an abiding love of war). Furthermore, as the collegial interview with Greene demonstrates, Carlson is far from the only high-profile MAGA member to split with Trump over the Israel-Iran war. Fellow far-right pundits like Candace Owens and Steve Bannon have strongly criticized the president for breaking his campaign pledge to start no new wars, even if some of them have already fallen back in line. Counterpoint or counterprogramming? Perhaps theres a good reason why Carlson might be more animated about all this than his counterparts. When Carlson has spoken about his former employer Fox News recently, his tone has been bitter. He seems to hold a grudge against the network for casting him out of the mainstream and into the fringe by abruptly firing him in 2023. Now that the pro-war coverage on Fox News has reportedly helped Trump decide to strike Iran, Carlson may see an opportunity to provide counterprogramming as a member of the independent media, free from the pro-Trump uniformity of Fox News. If it sounds far-fetched that the network would demand its reporters support Trump, well, Carlson recently claimed that he once helped enforce support at the network. One need only to watch Fox News’s prime-time lineup for a few minutes on any given night to conclude that there’s not much room to disagree with Trump as publicly and as vehemently as Carlson recently has, let alone any incentive for it. On the other hand, there certainly seems to be an upside for Carlson to do so from a distance. As CNN reports, The Tucker Carlson Show jumped to No. 5 on YouTubes weekly podcast rankings, up from a No. 18 ranking last month, and is now No. 2 on Spotifys podcast chart, just behind Joe Rogan. Maybe the critical coverage will cost Carlson some support in the long run, forcing him to backpedal. For now, though, its earning him too much positive attention to change course. The worst person you know just made a great pointand is being rewarded handsomely for it.
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E-Commerce
People on TikTok tend to follow accounts that align with their own political beliefs, meaning the platform is creating political echo chambers among its users. These findings, from a study my collaborators, Yanlin Li and Homero Gil de Zúiga, and I published in the academic journal New Media & Society, show that people mostly hear from voices they already agree with. We analyzed the structure of different political networks on TikTok and found that right-leaning communities are more isolated from other political groups and from mainstream news outlets. Looking at their internal structures, the right-leaning communities are more tightly connected than their left-leaning counterparts. In other words, conservative TikTok users tend to stick together. They rarely follow accounts with opposing views or mainstream media accounts. Liberal users, on the other hand, are more likely to follow a mix of accounts, including those they might disagree with. Our study is based on a massive dataset of over 16 million TikTok videos from more than 160,000 public accounts between 2019 and 2023. We saw a spike of political TikTok videos during the 2020 U.S. presidential election. More importantly, people arent just passively watching political content; theyre actively creating political content themselves. Some people are more outspoken about politics than others. We found that users with stronger political leanings and those who get more likes and comments on their videos are more motivated to keep posting. This shows the power of partisanship, but also the power of TikToks social rewards system. Engagement signalslikes, shares, commentsare like a fuel, encouraging users to create even more. Why it matters People are turning to TikTok not just for a good laugh. A recent Pew Research Center survey shows that almost 40% of U.S. adults under 30 regularly get news on TikTok. The question becomes what kind of news are they watching, and what does that mean for how they engage with politics. The content on TikTok often comes from creators and influencers or digital-native media sources. The quality of this news content remains uncertain. Without access to balanced, fact-based information, people may struggle to make informed political decisions. Amid the debates over banning TikTok, our study highlights how TikTok can be a double-edged sword in political communication. Its encouraging to see people participate in politics through TikTok when thats their medium of choice. However, if a users network is closed and homogeneous and their expression serves as in-group validation, it may further solidify the political echo chamber. When people are exposed to one-sided messages, it can increase hostility toward outgroups. In the long run, relying on TikTok as a source for political information might deepen peoples political views and contribute to greater polarization. What other research is being done Echo chambers have been widely studied on platforms like Twitter and Facebook, but similar research on TikTok is in its infancy. TikTok is drawing scrutiny, particularly its role in news production, political messaging, and social movements. TikTok has its unique format, algorithmic curation and entertainment-driven design. I believe that its function as a tool for political communication calls for closer examination. Whats next In 2024, the Biden/Harris and Trump campaigns joined TikTok to reach young voters. My research team is now analyzing how these political communication dynamics may have shifted during the 2024 election. Future research could use experiments to explore whether these campaign videos significantly influence voters perceptions and behaviors. The Research Brief is a short take on interesting academic work. Zicheng Cheng is an assistant professor of mass communications at the University of Arizona. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
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