Trump Floats Credit Card Rate Cap as Financial Stocks Split
It’s no Maduro capture, but Trump’s Friday evening bombshell still rattled Wall Street. After markets wrapped, the President teased a 1-year, 10% cap on credit card rates — halving the current average range of 19.65% to 21.5%. Vanderbilt researchers estimate it could save Americans roughly $100B a year, splitting stocks as financial sector fortunes diverged.
- High-rate issuers like Synchrony, Bread Financial, and Capital One plunged as much as 10.6% on Monday — while even premium-focused Amex fell 4.3%.
- Banks pushed back hard, warning that erased profits would force tighter lending standards for sub-600 credit scores — likely killing rewards programs too.
The fine print: While traditional card issuers tumbled, buy-now-pay-later stocks surged in pre-market — Affirm jumped 4%, and Block rose 2% as investors bet on alternative credit winners. Still, a Jefferies analyst calls Trump’s proposal “highly unlikely” to become reality, noting the President lacks executive authority and Congress would likely kill it on arrival. Even so, Truist warns the noise “opens the debate” about pricing cuts even if the 10% cap dies.
