William D. Cohan • April 9, 2025

When the Bond Market Panics Like This…

Trump’s global tariff war has wiped out more than $5 trillion in equity-market value. But, as always, the most reliable clue about what’s heading our way is the bond market. Buckle up…

William D. Cohan • April 6, 2025

Wall Street’s Tariff Hunger Games

There are multiple contradictory theories making the rounds among smart investors to rationalize Trump’s trade war: forcing other nations to play fair, raising revenue to offset tax cuts, crashing the economy to refinance the debt. The one point of agreement: C.E.O.s are nervous, very nervous.

William D. Cohan • April 2, 2025

Carlos Watson’s Prison Break

How Carlos Watson, with help from Donald Trump and his “pardon czar,” remade himself as the victim of his own $100 million fraud.

William D. Cohan • March 30, 2025

Elon Deal Alchemy & The I.P.O. False Spring

News and notes on the biggest deals of the week on Wall Street, for better or worse.

William D. Cohan • March 26, 2025

Wall Street Prepares to Get Paul Weiss’d

Many senior finance executives are terrified that, once Trump finishes throwing darts at Big Law, he’ll take aim at banks and private equity firms. “If the government decides that it wants to get you, … don’t fight,” one Wall Street C.E.O. told me.

William D. Cohan & Peter Hamby • March 23, 2025

Where’s My Gary Cohn?

An honest conversation about the stock market “correction,” the folly of Trump’s trade wars, the Scott Bessent security blanket, the rotation into Europe, and why Wall Street is missing Gary Cohn.

William D. Cohan • March 19, 2025

In Bessent We Trust?

Mike Mayo, the august Wells Fargo analyst, offers the bull case for Trump’s hard reset of the economy, strangling bureaucracy, gutting Dodd-Frank, and why he thinks the banking sector is ready to rip. Has Mike sipped the Kool-Aid, or should everyone just chill out?

William D. Cohan • March 16, 2025

Trump’s M&A Poison Pill

News and notes from around the financial sector: an update on the latest pseudo obstacle to the Skydance bid for Paramount Global, a banker’s lament for the frozen M&A pipeline under Trump II, and a close look at how Elon Musk’s businesses have been faring since the election.

William D. Cohan • March 12, 2025

Between Clare Locke & A Hard Place

The ultrawealthy are feeling emboldened to file lawsuits against journalists and their publishers, perhaps inspired by Donald Trump’s giddy disregard for a free press. In his new book, ‘Murder the Truth,’ David Enrich forecasts a dangerous endgame.

William D. Cohan • March 9, 2025

Bloods & Crypto Bros

The crypto faithful believe the new consensus in Washington—a $Trump-empowered, zero-regulation, free-for-all—will make all their dreams come true, starting with a plan to create a Bitcoin Fort Knox.

William D. Cohan • March 6, 2025

Ackman’s Oedipus Complex

Ackman’s professed admiration for his hero Warren Buffett was questioned in some quarters after a recent podcast appearance, where the hedge fund billionaire appeared to second-guess the Oracle of Omaha’s strategy.

William D. Cohan • March 2, 2025

Has Zaz Finally Seen His Shadow?

Three years after the fraught inception of David Zaslav’s Warner Bros. Discovery, the company’s Q4 earnings report suggests that things are finally turning a corner—and investors seem to agree. But can Zaz continue to outrun the decline of the TV business?

William D. Cohan • February 26, 2025

Ackman’s Olympus

The flamboyant hedge fund billionaire, Ivy president basher, and prolific X poster is back with a revised bid to attempt to turn a middling real estate company into a Berkshire-style cash machine, and give himself the inside track to becoming his generation’s Warren Buffett.

William D. Cohan • February 23, 2025

Sorkin Dialogue

The indefatigable Andrew Ross Sorkin spills the tea on his enigmatic and highly anticipated forthcoming tome on the Great Depression.

William D. Cohan • February 20, 2025

The Wise Men of Wall Street Sound Off on Trump

A survey of industry machers on the Elon factor, the yet-to-materialize investment banking boom, Treasury troubles, that $2 trillion deficit, and the good ideas hiding inside the White House’s agenda.