Weekly column: Tariffs, turmoil, and the retrograde effect

Review

President Trump’s self-imposed Feb. 1 deadline for a first round of tariffs on Canada, Mexico, and China looms in just hours as economic observers and world leaders try to plan amid the uncertainty. On Thursday afternoon, Trump reiterated his plans to put a 25% tariff on imports from Mexico and Canada. But even then, he added to the uncertainty by saying some provisions — specifically those around oil — remain undecided.

—Ben Werschkul, “Markets (and the World) on Edge as Trump’s Tariff Deadline Approaches,” Yahoo Finance, January 31, 2025.

“We are going to require a commitment from these seemingly hostile Countries that they will neither create a new BRICS Currency, nor back any other Currency to replace the mighty U.S. Dollar, or, they will face 100% Tariffs. They can go find another sucker Nation.”

—Donald Trump, quoted by Alex Nitzberg, “Trump Reasserts Towering 100% Tariff Threat Against BRICS Countries,” www.foxbusiness.com, January 31, 2025.

Stocks rose in early 2025, even as fears over tariffs, rates, and China’s surprise AI win took turns rattling investors.

—Ryan Dezember, “Markets End January Higher, and With One More Speed Bump,” www.wsj.com, January 31, 2025.

Typical of a New Moon in Aquarius and its ruler Uranus changing direction, many global stock indices and Gold rallied late last week, then suddenly reversed on Friday. Both Aquarius and its ruler, Uranus, are known to exhibit dynamics of suddenness and disruption, often under the guise of brilliance and “thinking outside of the  box.”

The cause of the rallies and sudden reversals in global equity and Gold markets is likely in anticipation of new taxes (tariffs) about to be imposed on the world by the leadership of the United States on Saturday, February 1. In addition to actually creating a new tax on the consumers, this highly anticipated executive order also has the potential to disrupt distribution networks and supply chains involving world trade and, hence, result in higher prices (inflationary). On the positive side, this initiative also has the potential to level the world trade playing field, where the U.S. pays considerably more in tariffs to receive goods produced in other nations than it receives from goods exported. So there are two sides to this issue: one is “fairness” in trade, and the other is the economic consequences (disruption of trade routes and probably increase in inflation). How to manage both with balance is the challenge.

One way to counter the inflationary potential of an increase in tariffs is to increase the supply of goods produced domestically, thus prodding producers to lower prices to maintain market share. Can that be achieved? This seems to be the rationale for supporting this pending executive order. With Jupiter (world trade) square to Saturn (depressed, reduced, constrained), it seems probable that world trade will go through a challenging time this year, and stock markets may suddenly recognize this.

Nevertheless, stock markets were chaotic last week (as they have been all of this New Year), but mostly up. Yet, there remain to be many examples of continuing bearish divergence. In Asia and the Pacific Rim, the ASX of Australia made a new all-time high on Friday, whereas India’s NIFTY Indexes fell to a new 7-month low early last week.

In Europe, the German DAX and London FTSE indices also made new all-time highs, while the Netherlands AEX and Zurich SMI also enjoyed strong rallies to new multi-month highs.

In the Americas, the Bovespa of Brazil rallied strongly into early Friday but then sold off and closed down 777 points. That same pattern unfolded in the U.S., where the major stock indices were up nicely all week, testing all-time highs early on Friday but then selling off sharply by the close. The DJIA, for instance, came within 20 points of its all-time high but then closed down 337 points. Intermarket bearish divergence continues to be present from the prior week’s all-time high in the S&P that was not matched (yet) in the NASDAQ or DJIA.

Gold soared to a new all-time high of 2853 in the nearby April contract and sold off late Friday. Silver, too, had a healthy rally, rising to 32.92 on Friday before selling off 70 cents into the close. Bitcoin attempted to make a new all-time high but fell short at 106,440 on Thursday before dropping nearly $5000 on Friday’s low. Crude Oil continued to fall all week, reaching a low of 72.02 on Friday. The prior week, it was testing 80.00.

Short-term geocosmics and longer-term thoughts

The Trump administration rescinded its memo calling for federal agencies to pause potentially trillions of dollars in federal grants, loans, and other financial-assistance programs, a day after a federal judge temporarily blocked the directive that had sowed widespread confusion. The White House on Wednesday issued a memo to federal employees scrapping its original memorandum.

—Natalie Andrews, Liz Essley Whyte, and Michelle Hackman, “White House Rescinds Order to Freeze Assistance, Grants: Trump Team’s Memo Prompted Chaos,” Wall Street Journal, January 30, 2025.

Who saw that coming? Not Wall Street, which sold off tech stocks on Monday after the weekend news that a highly sophisticated Chinese AI model, DeepSeek, rivals Big Tech-built systems but cost a fraction to develop. The implications are likely to be far-reaching, and not merely in equities….The tech-heavy Nasdaq fell 3.1%, driven by a 16.9% dive in Nvidia shares. Nvidia dominates the market in advanced AI chips.

—The Editorial Board, Review & Outlook, “The DeepSeek AI Freakout,” Wall Street Journal, January 27, 2025.

The “retrograde chaos” described in these recent columns and last week’s micro-webinar on “What the !@#$%^& Is Happening” was in full form last week. That is the “start-go-restart-stop again” nature of all three personal planets (Mercury, Mars, Venus, then Mercury again) going retrograde, back-to-back, between November 25, 2024, and April 12, 2025. Initiatives like new tariffs and government funding freezes start with great gusto without sufficient information or oversight, then pulled back and were either revised, tried again, or discarded altogether. The result is chaos and confusion. Such a cosmic “retrograde chaos” climate is a time to work out ideas and strategies for their eventual successful implantation. It is not the time to shoot first and then figure out what you are aiming for.

Another example of “starting then pausing” may be about to take place in the financial world of Sam Altman. He is on the verge of securing a $500 billion commitment to build Open AI’s data center empire called StarGate. But then, suddenly (Uranus again, plus “retrograde chaos”) comes the announcement that a new Chinese company is releasing its advanced version of AI called DeepSeek, which is only a fraction of the cost of StarGate. Based on the transits to Altman’s natal chart (born April 25, 1985), things might not go quite the way he thinks or wishes.

First off, transiting Pluto in early Aquarius will be forming a waning square to Altman’s natal Sun at 2° Taurus. Pluto, in a hard aspect to a personal planet, indicates power plays, and if not handled just right, it often results in a loss of power. As stated several times in this column, no one escapes a hard Pluto transit unscathed without a “surrender” of sorts. Trump had it in the 2020 Election that he lost (and refused to concede), and Biden had it in the 2024 election, which he claims he would have won had he not been “forced” to withdraw by his own party.

It doesn’t end there. Altman also has a natal Mars/Saturn opposition at 26-27° of Taurus and Scorpio, respectively, with the Moon also around that degree in late Taurus (depending on his time of birth). Transiting Uranus is in late Taurus throughout much of this year (conjunct his Mars/Moon, opposite his Saturn). This is not an indicator of one who succeeds by being rigid and not making adjustments as required. More often, Uranus transits to Saturn can be very disruptive to one’s plans and authority in management. This aspect often (but not always) leads to the subject being “fired” by an employer, or a board of directors, rebelled against by one’s employees, or even encountering problems with the government and its laws/rules.

Interestingly enough, we see similar Uranus transits to the charts of Jensen Huang (February 17, 1968) and Nvidia, the company he runs (founded April 5, 1999). Huang has his Sun at 27° Aquarius. Nvidia has its Saturn there, squared by natal Pluto at 25° Scorpio (another power play). Uranus is challenging both in a T-square. This transformational period in the life of Huang and Nvidia was pointed out in a May 2024 interview with Radio Tokyo. Nvidia is in the midst of a wild ride in 2025, and you have to wonder if Altman and Stargate AI are in store for a similar wild ride. Neither of these gentlemen’s plans is likely to materialize as they expect. Both may find themselves in very different situations (perhaps against their will) by the end of the year unless they understand how to integrate these principles well. Uranus involves not being overly disruptive and doing what you said you would do without breaking the rules. Surprising others by suddenly shifting directions is not advised. Saturn involves integrity and honesty. With the opposition, it may be that they see others they have to deal with as lacking in these qualities, which disrupts their plans. With Uranus and Saturn, it is usually a case of someone violating a promise or agreement that can lead to changes that threaten the stability of the enterprise.

This is going to be an interesting and perhaps very volatile year for tech companies throughout the world.