Corporate winners and losers of the ‘big beautiful bill’

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Corporate America is broadly happy with Donald Trump’s “big, beautiful bill” since it extends tax cuts that make companies giddy. 

But there are some clear winners and losers. Here’s a breakdown by sector: 

Finance

The $13tn private capital sector — which includes investment firms such as Blackstone and Apollo — maintained their precious carried interest tax loophole, something Trump had said he’d close. The loophole allows these dealmakers to pay the long-term capital gains tax rate on the performance profits they earn, instead of far higher income tax rates. 

Banks will benefit from a deep slash in funding for the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, a watchdog they’ve accused of overstepping its mandates.

Tech

Companies such as Amazon, Google, Meta and Microsoft had been lobbying intensely for a 10-year moratorium on state regulation of artificial intelligence, but the Senate voted it down. This means these groups, along with start-ups such as OpenAI and Anthropic can expect new rules throughout the US.

Defence

The defence sector is one of the biggest winners. The bill adds $150bn to the Pentagon’s budget, including a $23bn “down payment” on Trump’s “Golden Dome” missile defence system, $28bn for shipbuilding and more money for artillery and ammunition. The Golden Dome in particular will be a bonanza for established giants like Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman, but also tech groups such as Palantir and Anduril. 

Energy

It’s a mixed bag for the energy sector. The coal industry got a last-minute win — producers of metallurgical coal will be able to get back 2.5 per cent of their costs against their taxes.

While certain zero-carbon energy sources such as geothermal, hydropower and nuclear are keeping lucrative tax credits, many solar and wind projects will lose investment and production tax credits. Tax incentives for electric vehicles — a hallmark of Joe Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act — will go poof in September. Credits for homeowners who put solar panels and heat pumps in their homes will also wind down.

Retail and healthcare

One of the most contentious parts of the bill is the $9bn cut to federal food assistance programme, Snap, which will suppress grocery spending. Food companies ConAgra, Kellogg and Kraft Heinz had the highest shares of spending by Snap users.

The most severe cuts to Medicaid, which gives health insurance to low-income Americans, were walked back, but smaller hospitals that rely on this money could struggle. The cuts are expected to increase the number of people without health insurance by 11.8mn.

The latest headlines

What we’re hearing

Ahisary moved from Mexico in 1993 to South Central Los Angeles, where she worked multiple jobs and raised three children. In all that time as an undocumented migrant in the US, she has never experienced anything like the fear of the past few weeks.

“People are afraid that it’s not safe to go out,” Ahisary, who asked her name be changed for her safety, told the FT’s Christopher Grimes, through an interpreter. “It’s unfortunate because people have to go to work. If they don’t go to work, how are they going to pay their bills?”

When outlining his vision for mass deportations during the presidential campaign, Trump said he would prioritise targeting those with criminal records for removal. But the policy has broadened to include undocumented migrants with deep ties in the US who do not have criminal histories, especially in large Democratic cities.

At the heart of Trump’s mass deportation efforts is US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). The federal law enforcement agency has used aggressive tactics, striking fear and terror throughout the country’s immigrant communities.

“I think the shift is that the administration is realising that if you continue to focus on the criminal population [they’re] never going to get to those [deportation] numbers that [they’re] looking for”, John Sandweg, a former ICE acting director during Barack Obama’s administration, told me.

As ICE puts on a show of force, featuring masked agents in bulletproof vests, the message to undocumented immigrants is clear: go home before we get you.

Of the 56,397 people held in ICE detention as of June 15, 71.7 per cent had no criminal record, according to the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, which tracks federal enforcement activities. The number of immigrants in detention with no criminal charges or convictions jumped 1,300 per cent from January to mid-June, according to David Bier of the Cato Institute, a libertarian think-tank.

“[The] fear factor is [an] extremely important part of the overall mass deportation initiative,” said Doris Meissner, former commissioner of the US Immigration and Naturalization Service, an ICE precursor.

Viewpoints

The US had the potential to become the first truly mighty republic since Roman times, but Trump has put all of that at risk, according to Martin Wolf.

Tariffs in theory could provide an incentive for new copper production by pushing up the price, but miners plan their investments over decades and duties could easily vanish, writes John Foley in his latest Lex column.

The ineptitude of Trump’s tariffs and the damage to the US’s growth prospects offer a cautionary tale to other governments entertaining a similar idea, writes Alan Beattie.

Iran’s foreign minister Abbas Araghchi says the country is interested in diplomacy with the US but has “good reason to have doubts about further dialogue”.