Everyone was deceived, Trump and Musk were caught laughing and chatting, and the stock market and cryptocurrency retail investors became the victims.
On September 21, U.S. President Trump and Tesla CEO Musk appeared at the same memorial event and were caught laughing and chatting.
This was their first public contact since they had a falling-out in June this year over fiscal policy disputes.
Three months ago, the two were still accusing each other on social media, appearing to be completely broken up.
However, this time, they were seen together at the memorial ceremony of conservative activist Charlie Kirk, even sitting side by side and behaving casually, looking as if there were no cracks in their relationship.
Evidently, the two have been playing a double act all along, and now they don't even bother to pretend anymore.
In fact, Trump and Musk have never been complete enemies.
Since Musk took over as the head of the Department of Government Efficiency, people have been paying attention to his voice in cutting fiscal deficits and optimizing the federal budget.
But when Trump introduced the Big Beautiful Act, Musk publicly criticized it for being wasteful, leading to a fierce confrontation between the two.
Looking back, their conflict coincided with a period of volatility in Bitcoin and the stock market, a sensitive moment when Tesla's stock was declining, high-tech stocks were under pressure, and the cryptocurrency market was experiencing intense bull and bear battles.
Their clashes injected more uncertainty into the market and created an emotional trading atmosphere.
Now, their reconciled meeting coincides with a time of stock market rebound.
This naturally makes one think of a classic tactic: one plays the good cop, the other the bad cop, and finally both reap the emotions of retail investors.
This kind of double act is common in the U.S. political and business system.
Musk is a trendsetter in the cryptocurrency market, while Trump has long influenced the trends of energy, defense, and tech stocks by manipulating political hotspots.
Over the past few months, affected by the conflict between Musk and Trump, Bitcoin once fell by more than 20%, and some high-growth tech stocks also saw significant declines due to regulatory uncertainties.
However, institutional investors took advantage of the situation to build positions, while ordinary retail investors often followed the trend, got stuck at high prices, and sold at low prices.
This "harvesting" pattern has become a standard: first create a controversial topic to attract attention, then guide the market direction through rhetoric, and finally adjust the layout when the public opinion subsides, with all those influenced by emotions becoming the targets of harvest.
Original source: www.toutiao.com/article/1843933193524295/
Statement: The article represents the views of the author.