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Every weekday, the CNBC Investing Club with Jim Cramer releases the Homestretch — an actionable afternoon update, just in time for the last hour of trading on Wall Street. Markets: It’s an ugly day for Wall Street as the Trump administration’s highly anticipated tariff plan proved to be more aggressive and widespread than the market anticipated. It’s a day of s weeping price-to-earnings (P/E) multiple compression across the stock market because investors are struggling to accurately forecast what companies will earn in a slowing growth environment with tariffs eating into a chunk of their profits. That’s a key dynamic playing out in the market Thursday. Fear of the unknown “E” — earnings — is causing investors to sell out of anything with cyclicality and overseas operations. There will be opportunities here on a case-by-case basis as we get a better picture of what management teams are best equipped to mitigate the tariffs by taking price and driving cost efficiencies — in other words, doing what they can to protect earnings. For example, we added to our position in Eaton . It has pricing power because its products are in such short supply. We also don’t want to lose sight of how the tariff news didn’t come out of the blue and the market started to price in a slowdown over the past six weeks. The selling could continue, but many stocks are already down 20% or more from their highs. But for Thursday, the market wants to wait out the storm in stocks where the earnings will be least impacted by the economy and tariffs, explaining why domestic companies with minimal international operations and defensive groups like staples, utilities and health care are outperforming. Capital One: The Capital One – Discover merger moved one step closer to approval. The New York Times reported Thursday that the U.S. Justice Department said in a memo to the Federal Reserve and Office of the Comptroller of the Currency that it doesn’t have enough evidence to block the deal. This is significant because the Justice Department was the most likely of the three agencies to block the deal, according to The Times. The deal is still waiting for approval by the Federal Reserve and OCC, but this news clears a big hurdle. Signs were pointing this way, as we wrote in Monday’s Homestretch , and we’re glad to see more confirmation. We’re surprised Capital One shares are not trading higher off this report. When the headline first broke, the stock traded from $163 to as high as $176 before settling under $170. Sure, the market is worried about the slowdown in consumer spending and an increase in delinquency rates. That’s the risk impacting all credit card and banking stocks — hence why American Express shares are down 10% Thursday, too. But with Capital One moving one big step closer to securing a deal that will be highly accretive to its earnings per share, we think the stock should be higher from here. The market only wants to focus on the bad news right now and is ignoring this positive development. We would be buyers of Capital One shares Thursday if we were not restricted from trading it. Up next: There are no major earnings reports after the closing bell Thursday or before the opening bell Friday. But let’s see if there are any brave companies out there willing to comment on the impact tariffs have on their earnings. On the economic data side, we’ll see the March nonfarm payroll report . The market will be paying close attention to the monthly job gains, which are estimated to be 140,000, and the unemployment rate, which is estimated to be unchanged at 4.1%. (See here for a full list of the stocks in Jim Cramer’s Charitable Trust.) As a subscriber to the CNBC Investing Club with Jim Cramer, you will receive a trade alert before Jim makes a trade. Jim waits 45 minutes after sending a trade alert before buying or selling a stock in his charitable trust’s portfolio. If Jim has talked about a stock on CNBC TV, he waits 72 hours after issuing the trade alert before executing the trade. THE ABOVE INVESTING CLUB INFORMATION IS SUBJECT TO OUR TERMS AND CONDITIONS AND PRIVACY POLICY , TOGETHER WITH OUR DISCLAIMER . NO FIDUCIARY OBLIGATION OR DUTY EXISTS, OR IS CREATED, BY VIRTUE OF YOUR RECEIPT OF ANY INFORMATION PROVIDED IN CONNECTION WITH THE INVESTING CLUB. NO SPECIFIC OUTCOME OR PROFIT IS GUARANTEED.
Every weekday, the CNBC Investing Club with Jim Cramer releases the Homestretch — an actionable afternoon update, just in time for the last hour of trading on Wall Street.
