By coinnews 
00:00 News Anchor
President Trump’s shifting trade policies have created a mountain of uncertainty for both consumers and businesses. That ongoing uncertainty around trade and inflation worries, sending US consumer sentiment falling to one of the lowest readings on record. Businesses shedding light on the impact from this deteriorating consumer confidence, as well as drawbacks from the unpredictability of tariffs. Here’s some of what executives had to share so far this earning season.
00:27 Speaker A
Consumer confidence has dropped, and the discretionary side of demand has dropped quite a bit. So, what we do see, so, right now is strong replacement demand that has kept up very strong since COVID. But, the discretionary side, yeah, it took its toll, and and right now, we we don’t see it even in Q2 so far recovering.
00:48 Speaker B
All of our initiatives are on track, so the company is doing great. But no, we were highly impacted on the demand side by the tariffs, and then just the the consumer confidence erosion. The first quarter fell off about three full points, and the second quarter has fallen off about six full points, compared to what we thought in January. So, that gives you an a good indication of the of the level of impact on demand, and just how rapidly uh the the decrease in demand uh fell.
01:21 Speaker C
So, we are I think the least company the least affected car company with with respect to tariffs uh at least in most respects. I mean, remains to be seen. Now now tariffs are still you know, tough on a company when margins are still low.
01:56 Speaker D
What we are seeing is the frequency drop. Uh so, consumers are still spending. They’re still getting their favorite sides, their add-ons, whether that’s guac or delicious queso. We’re not seeing attachment slip. We’re just seeing frequency of our customer again. We don’t have a customer issue. We have a frequency challenge.
02:18 Speaker E
We are um off to a relatively strong start, um but what we are anticipating and what’s built into our guidance that uh you know, the macro is going to start to catch up to the uh implications of the tariffs. And so, June is likely to be softer than our strong start to the quarter.
02:48 Speaker F
Tariffs are unpredictable at this point. Obviously, we’re watching closely. Um if they come in, and they’re significant in some way, you know, that’s going to have to be born by the customer. I mean, our model isn’t prepared for something like that. Um and I think what would happen is prices will rise for smartphones, and then people will slow down their purchases of smartphones, and upgrade rates will slow.
03:13 Speaker G
We’ve chosen uh not to blink, not to flinch, but instead uh commit ourselves to investment continued investment in innovation and demand creation for our brands. We’ve modestly reduced guidance uh to 2% on the fiscal year for the top line. Our fiscal year ends in a couple of months. And uh 2 to 4% on the bottom line to reflect that approach and that choice, as well as to reflect uh this fiscal year’s uh impact of tariffs.