Walmart shares had their worst day in over a year Thursday, despite robust fourth-quarter results. And the retail giant’s heirs lost billions.
The retailer’s guidance for this year was weaker than Wall Street expected, causing its stock to plummet 6.5%, and each of Walmart founder Sam Walton’s three living children saw more than $6 billion knocked off their net worth.
Walmart, the world’s largest company by revenue, cautioned about tariffs. “We’re wired to try and save people money, so that’ll be our ultimate goal,” CEO Doug McMillon said.
FIRST UP
President Donald Trump has proposed a space-based missile defense shield for the United States, similar to Israel’s Iron Dome, and for the last six years, the Pentagon’s Space Development Agency has been working on a key part of what’s needed to make it a reality. But the head of the agency was put on leave a week before Trump’s inauguration, a bureaucratic power struggle over the program is slowing progress, and the future of the agency itself is in doubt.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy ordered a “compliance” review of California’s efforts to build the nation’s first high-speed rail network, hinting that $4 billion of federal funds could be taken back from the controversial project. The total projected cost of the 400-mile network is pegged at about $100 billion, of which $15.7 billion has been spent—using only about $3 billion of federal money so far. Still, Duffy said that both the rising cost of the railway and its fuzzy timeline for completion make it a bad bet for U.S. taxpayers.
This is a published version of the Forbes Daily newsletter, you can sign-up to get Forbes Daily in your inbox here.
BUSINESS + FINANCE
Nissan Motor’s shares surged Friday morning after a report emerged that a high-level Japanese group plans to seek Tesla’s investment in the company, just days after merger talks with rival Honda collapsed. The group marshaling the plan is reportedly hoping to bring Tesla on board as a strategic investor in Nissan, as they believe the Elon Musk-led company wants to acquire the struggling Japanese carmaker’s manufacturing plants in the U.S.
Trump said he’s considering the idea floated by Elon Musk of $5,000 checks for American citizens with the savings from DOGE’s cost-cutting initiatives, but that figure relies on a highly ambitious and (and potentially impossible) target for DOGE’s savings. Plus, the payout program could lead to further inflation, as consumer spending would immediately increase.
TECH + INNOVATION
The CEO of facial recognition company Clearview AI has resigned, and the controversial firm has tapped new leadership to capitalize on “emerging opportunities” under the Trump Administration, the company confirmed to Forbes. The firm sparked backlash in 2020 after it scraped billions of social media images without users’ consent, and was never able to develop a robust business selling to federal agencies under the Biden Administration.
Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump invested in a new company aiming to build AI data centers, just weeks after their father announced a major push to expand the country’s artificial intelligence infrastructure and loosen regulations. The brothers’ investment gives them a new avenue to potentially profit from government-backed industry growth.
MONEY + POLITICS
Senator Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) announced he will not seek reelection next year, after stepping down as the GOP Senate leader last year. He’s the longest-serving Senate party leader in history, but in recent years has feuded with President Donald Trump.
The Senate confirmed Kash Patel as FBI director Thursday, despite opposition from Senators Susan Collins (R-Maine), and Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska). Patel, a staunch Trump loyalist, has faced pushback from Democrats over threats to go after political enemies.
Recent polls show most of President Donald Trump’s signature policies are unpopular with Americans: A Washington Post-Ipsos survey found 57% of respondents believe Trump has exceeded his authority since taking office, for instance. Of eight policies surveyed, his pardoning of people convicted of violent crimes in the January 6 Capitol riots was the least popular.
SPORTS + ENTERTAINMENT
The Lionel Messi effect has rippled across Major League Soccer, but it hasn’t yet produced a change at the front of the fleet on Forbes’ Most Valuable MLS Teams list. For the third straight year, Los Angeles FC is the league’s most valuable team, worth an estimated $1.25 billion, just ahead of Messi’s Inter Miami at $1.2 billion.
TRAVEL + LIFESTYLE
Delta is offering $30,000 to each passenger on board the plane that crashed in Toronto Monday, which would amount to $2.3 million if everyone were to accept the offer. But the gesture of goodwill may be just the beginning of what the airline will have to pay, as three aviation law firms told Forbes they’ve been in contact with or retained by multiple passengers.
TRENDS + EXPLAINERS
Elon Musk’s DOGE has requested access to sensitive taxpayer data at the IRS, prompting concerns from taxpayers and tax professionals alike. Currently, there are strict rules around accessing such data, passed as a result of Nixon Administration abuses. The Washington Post reports that the Trump administration and the Treasury Department agreed to give DOGE read-only access to anonymized tax data–the same access granted to other IT professionals who work on IRS systems.
DAILY COVER STORY
Elon Musk Is A Billionaire Federal Welfare Vampire
TOPLINE Elon Musk, the South Africa-born billionaire overseeing President Trump’s massive and haphazard effort to hack down government overspending, is among the largest beneficiaries of federal government support ever. His empire was built on it.
In the past 15 years alone, Tesla (Musk’s $1.1 trillion company) and SpaceX (his company valued at $350 billion), have sucked in a stunning $30 billion in public dollars. Meanwhile, Musk’s personal wealth ballooned from $2 billion in 2012 to over $400 billion in December; he’s now worth $393 billion.
As context for DOGE’s move fast and break government things effort—which has so far resulted in dubious claims of eliminating $55 billion in federal spending that was only $8.5 billion and firing at least 200,000 government workers, including FAA staff, specialists overseeing nuclear weapons safety or trying to stop an avian flu pandemic—Musk’s decades-long reliance on government funds to grow and enrich his own companies is a bit dissonant.
Federal funds helped Tesla and SpaceX find their footing when they were fledgling, unproven startups over 15 years ago. In the case of Tesla, which narrowly avoided a bankruptcy filing in late 2008, a loan from the Energy Department proved to be a lifeline. It helped the company set up its first factory faster and at a lower cost, owing to a lower interest rate, than if it had relied solely on private funds.
And SpaceX, which had just begun putting its rockets into orbit in 2008 after multiple failures, wouldn’t have become NASA’s top provider of cargo and crew launches had the company not won a game-changing $1.6 billion contract that year.
WHY IT MATTERS “Tapping the world’s wealthiest person, who owes much of his success to aid from federal funds and programs, to oversee a massive reduction in government spending and staffing while one of his companies is also a major government contractor raises many red flags,” says Forbes senior editor Alan Ohnsman. “Conflicts of interest abound, and so far there’s little indication the Trump Administration is enforcing firm guidelines to prevent that. As government ethics expert Norman Eisen points out, Musk appears to be acting as an oligarch.”
MORE Why Elon Musk’s China Ties Are DOGE’s Biggest Conflict Of Interest
FACTS + COMMENTS
The number of Americans who self-identify as LGBTQ+ has skyrocketed since Gallup first measured the statistic, a new poll shows. Younger generations are much more likely to report being something other than heterosexual:
9.3%: The share of adults who identified as not strictly heterosexual in 2024, almost double the number reported in 2020
20%: The percentage of Gen Z adults who say they are LGBTQ+
1980s: The start of a decades-long rise in the number of Americans identifying as gay or queer, as LGBTQ+ acceptance has grown
STRATEGY + SUCCESS
Your 30s can be an ideal time for a career change: You’ve been in the workforce long enough to figure out what you enjoy, your skills and what’s important—not only for your work, but also your personal life. If you’re looking to pivot, research various careers, the job market, build up your professional network and pursue further education, if needed.
VIDEO
QUIZ
Amazon now has creative control over a popular film franchise after a reported conflict with the series’ longtime producers. What franchise is it?
A. James Bond
B. Star Wars
C. Fast & Furious
D. Star Trek
Check your answer.
Thanks for reading! This edition of Forbes Daily was edited by Sarah Whitmire and Chris Dobstaff.