Ken Griffin sounds alarm on Trump’s deals: ‘Tread carefully’

Ken Griffin, the CEO of Citadel, slammed President Donald Trump’s administration on Thursday for cutting deals with corporations that he believes are skirting around sweeping tariffs.

In recent months, several companies, including Nvidia and Apple, have reached deals with Trump on increasing investments and expanding in the United States — moves that have been viewed by critics as an effort to be seen in his good graces. Meanwhile, the administration has also pushed to take stakes in private companies, such as its 9.9% deal with U.S. chipmaker Intel announced last month.

During an exclusive interview with CNBC’s Sara Eisen, Griffin was asked whether Apple specifically should be exempt from tariffs, given the large number of U.S. citizens who purchase iPhones and other products from the technology giant.

Griffin responded, “100% not,” and asked: “We’re just going to continue to favor big and connected businesses in America? Is that our country, that we’re going to favor the big and the connected? That’s not the American story.”

Griffin went on to say that “all of us lose” if “the state becomes involved in picking winners and losers.”

“I spoke about my concerns with the crony capitalism if we went down the path of tariffs,” Griffin, a leading Wall Street investor and billionaire, said. “The line outside the White House of every business arguing why they should be exempt from paying tariffs on what they import into their products is nauseating.”

Griffin, who described tariffs as similar to a “national sales tax,” said that they present “issues of equity and fairness,” arguing that the policies lead to a “disproportionately high” negative impact on the household income of lower and middle-class Americans.

“It’s the government’s engagement in picking winners and losers. And we should tread carefully on that water,” Griffin said, warning companies that are attempting to win favor from the White House.

“In fact, we should just stay out of it. That’s where the crocodiles live,” he added.

The exchange is not the first time that the hedge fund founder, and a megadonor to Republican candidates, has spoken out against Trump’s tariffs. In May, he emphasized that working-class Americans will ultimately be hit the “hardest” for the president’s tax on U.S. trading partners.

“That’s my big issue with tariffs,” Griffin said. “It’s such a painfully regressive tax.”

During the interview, Griffin also took aim at Trump’s threats against the Federal Reserve, which refused to cut interest rates for months, despite repeated demands from the president. Earlier this month, the central bank did cut rates by a quarter of a percentage point, marking the first time in nine months, while its chair, Jerome Powell, signaled on Tuesday that he expects the Fed to continue to take a more cautious approach.

“The Fed often has to make choices that are pretty painful to make. And if the president’s perceived as being in control of the Fed, then what happens when those painful choices have to be made?” Griffin asked.