Trump's 'Plane Wave' Diplomacy

More news on Iran… The '12-day war' ceasefire… Investors are optimistic in the short term… Powell's revenge? The Fed is still saying 'No' to lower rates… The obesity cure that Wall Street just shrugged off…

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There's a ceasefire – for now...

As we were going to press yesterday, President Donald Trump went to social media – again – to announce the framework for a ceasefire between Iran and Israel and declared that "what should be called, 'THE 12 DAY WAR'" should be over by this morning.

However, in the ensuing hours, both sides apparently violated the agreement. Trump said that the Israeli military dropped the biggest load of bombs he has seen during the conflict just after the deal was announced. Trump went on to say he wasn't "happy" with either side.

"We basically have two countries that have been fighting so long and so hard that they don't know what the f*** they're doing," Trump told reporters at the White House this morning. "Do you understand that?"

Yes, we do.

After those comments, Trump had a call with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Afterward, he posted that the "Ceasefire is in effect." He wrote that Israeli planes will "turn around and head home, while doing a friendly 'Plane Wave' to Iran. Nobody will be hurt."

Trump reiterated this idea to reporters on Air Force One today, minus the "plane wave" reference.

Still, we'll have to wait and see what happens with this "peace" after today... and the day after that.

Overall, the market is reflecting the idea that the 'worst' is over, at least in the short term...

Oil prices fell for a second straight day, and by more than 5% in the past 24 hours. And the major U.S. stock indexes were higher across the board.

The benchmark S&P 500 Index was up 1.1% and the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite Index rose about 1.4%. Bitcoin looked like a "risk on" play, gaining more than 6% in the past day to around $106,000.

Meanwhile, it doesn't appear that Iran's leadership plans to close the Strait of Hormuz – which is used to ship 20% of the world's crude oil. (Iran controls the northern part of the waterway that connects the Persian Gulf to the Gulf of Oman, which could be used as leverage in a continued war.) Investors see this as good news.

So is this... On Truth Social this morning, Trump said that "China can now continue to purchase Oil from Iran. Hopefully, they will be purchasing plenty from the U.S., also."

As we reported last month, Trump previously threatened that any country that bought oil from Iran would not "be allowed to do business with the U.S." This was a negotiating tactic to put pressure on Iran and its oil trading partners (primarily China, the world's second-largest economy and the largest buyer of oil from Iran).

This announcement is a sign of de-escalation on the Middle East war front and in U.S. relations with China. And while on-the-ground confirmation will be needed, it doesn't look like Iran has much of a nuclear program anymore, which has been a goal of the U.S. and its Western allies.

In other news...

Powell versus Trump...

Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell is making the rounds in Washington, D.C. for his semiannual testimony before Congress this week. Today, he took questions in front of a House committee for several hours.

What he said isn't likely to lead to peace in his ongoing conflict with Trump.

In short, Powell says the Fed isn't planning on cutting rates until it feels like it has more clarity on tariff policy or that the central bank has a better handle on the effects of tariffs on the economy. That might be a while... Remember, the 90-day reciprocal tariff "pause" is still in effect, and could be extended.

Here was one notable quote from today's testimony from Powell...

If you just look at the basic data and don't look at the forecast, you would say that we would've continued cutting. The difference, of course, is at this time all forecasters are expecting pretty soon that some significant inflation will show up from tariffs. And we can't just ignore that.

For a guy who professes to be following the backward-looking data all the time – often to the Fed's detriment – this is an interesting take. It makes it sound like Powell is picking what to emphasize, and he's choosing a prediction about higher prices due to tariffs in the future.

That may end up being right or wrong. We'll see soon enough. But in the meantime, it introduces the question of whether Powell and the Fed are holding rates where they are because they simply don't want to give in to Trump's demands for lower rates and name-calling ("numbskull!").

Because, as Powell alludes to, the Fed does have reasons to lower rates.

Remember, the Fed's official congressional mandate is to balance "stable prices" and "maximum employment" (and, less officially, as it has shown over the years, steer the U.S. economy away from recessions and help calm markets in times of "crisis").

The pace of inflation has dropped in recent months to a level consistent with the Fed's 2% annual target... GDP growth projections for the current quarter are at 3.4%... and Uncle Sam's official unemployment rate has plateaued at 4.2%, while still up from an early 2023 low of around 3.4%.

So formally, the pace of inflation has been coming down (albeit slowly), while the labor market has cooled off some, and growth is doing fine. Another Fed chair might have been inclined to cut rates last week. But Powell is still waiting and seeing about tariffs.

So what does this mean for the market?

Well, it's about expectations and if they change.

Federal-funds futures traders are putting roughly 80% odds on rates staying the same after the Fed's next meeting in late July. And they don't anticipate the central bank lowering rates until its September meeting, at the earliest.

If Powell signals that the Fed is willing to lower rates in the second half of this year, it would likely add some juice to the market. But if the Fed's "higher for longer" rate policy remains in place, bullish fuel would have to come from other sources.

Now, let's return to the weight-loss drug story...

Yesterday, we wrote about the exciting Phase III trial results Eli Lilly (LLY) shared over the weekend about its weight-loss pill. But that wasn't the only development from the American Diabetes Association annual meeting in Chicago.

Our Stansberry Venture Technology editor Dave Lashmet was there and saw impressive trial results from Eli Lilly competitor Novo Nordisk (NVO) for what Dave describes as a "cure for obesity."

On Sunday, Novo Nordisk showed results from its own Phase III trial of weight-loss treatment CagriSema, which combines two drugs – the artificial GLP-1 semaglutide and cagrilintide – in a single, two-chamber injection pen, at 2.4 milligrams each.

Semaglutide is the key ingredient found in Novo's weight-loss drug Wegovy and its Type 2 diabetes drug Ozempic. Cagrilintide is an artificial amylin, the naturally occurring hormone that controls blood sugar and provides a feeling of fullness in people.

(In a quick biology lesson, the real human amylin only lasts 15 minutes before breaking down in your bloodstream. Cagrilintide lasts on average a week in your bloodstream. So, it's an appetite suppressant that you take once a week.)

Novo is developing the combined drug CagriSema to help the 20% to 30% of people who don't respond to a GLP-1 like Wegovy, Ozempic, or Eli Lilly's Mounjaro.

As Dave reports, patients in the trial of CagriSema lost an average of 19 centimeters in waist circumference in 64 weeks – "like, eight belt notches," he said. And top-line weight loss was 22% over the course of the trial. As Dave wrote to us in an e-mail from Chicago...

But that's not what's amazing. Let me give you the three "amazings"...

1. Everyone on both cagrilintide and semaglutide lost weight, including 98% of people who lost at least 5% of their weight, which is the [Food and Drug Administration] threshold for a weight-loss drug.

2. Sixty percent of folks on the high dose of the drug lost 20% of their body weight. The mix was two-thirds fat and one-third muscle, just like with stomach banding or GLP-1 drugs. Folks felt really good and increased their movement and quality of life.

3. Patients could lower their drug dose if they hit their goals, and only about half the people stayed on the high dose by the end of the trial – although 75% or so hit [the] highest dose at some point this year. And here's where it gets interesting: Folks who voluntarily lowered their doses lost 25% of their weight and hit an average body mass index of 27.

In other words, this really, really works. Folks were not tapering from side effects. They were tapering because their obesity was cured.

This is important. An earlier trial of CagriSema, with results shared late last year, had investors concerned because only 57% of patients in the trial took the higher dose. As our Stansberry's Investment Advisory team wrote in the January issue...

That may suggest the drug's side effects are hard to tolerate in higher doses. But at this point, it's uncertain.

These latest trial results are more promising, because as Dave explains...

Materially, making 2.4 [milligrams] and 2.4 milligrams of these two proteins is easier on Novo's manufacturing than making 7.2 milligrams of semaglutide at the highest dose. It's 50% more efficient, so Novo can sell 50% more product. That's a boon.

Yet despite all this, Novo shares actually fell by more than 5% from Friday's close to yesterday's close. And Dave says that's an opportunity... because Wall Street is misguided about wanting to see even more weight loss from the drug trial.

First off, Dave points out that body weight is a number that can't go to zero. You have bones, a brain, a heart, muscles, and lungs that all weigh something.

And the 22% average weight loss reported in the trial is really the "average maximum in people trying to lose weight," Dave says. You see, after 25% loss, people started to taper off the drug. That's great news for anyone trying to shed pounds.

Novo shares were up more than 1% today.

Now, Novo does have competition, notably from Eli Lilly's promising weight-loss pill that we wrote about yesterday. But the most important takeaway, according to Dave, is that Novo has an obesity "cure" under its control.

Dave also said that everyone who joined the trial wanted to lose weight. But only 60% of the placebo group, which wasn't getting the drug, lost weight, basically through diet or exercise.

Again, on the trial drug, 100% of people lost weight, and 98% lost 5% of their bodyweight or more. As Dave says, "that's what we mean by 'a cure for obesity.'"

This is something Dave has been betting on for a long time...

He first recommended shares of Novo Nordisk to Stansberry Venture Technology subscribers back in June 2020, and he "gave away" the pick as a free recommendation to anyone who tuned in to a special presentation to learn about his research that same year.

A year later, the company launched Wegovy after getting U.S. Food and Drug Administration approval for the drug as a treatment for obesity.

The stock gained more traction and mainstream media attention in the summer of 2023, when trial data showed Wegovy reduced the risk of heart attacks and strokes by 20%, opening the door for it to be more widely prescribed beyond diabetes and weight-loss treatment. Dave covered that here.

But Dave and the Stansberry's Investment Advisory team have been tracking the drug for even longer... They first recommended owning NVO shares in the Investment Advisory in December 2019, when the stock traded for less than $60 per share, or $30 split adjusted today.

Shares are up around 180% since then, as the story about weight-loss drugs has continued to develop. And it's not over yet.

New 52-week highs (as of 6/23/25): Alpha Architect 1-3 Month Box Fund (BOXX), Cameco (CCJ), Cisco Systems (CSCO), Enel (ENLAY), GE Vernova (GEV), iShares U.S. Aerospace & Defense Fund (ITA), Microsoft (MSFT), Neuberger Berman Next Generation Connectivity Fund (NBXG), Newmont (NEM), New Gold (NGD), Ormat Technologies (ORA), Skeena Resources (SKE), Spotify Technology (SPOT), and Telefônica Brasil (VIV).

In today's mailbag, feedback on Dan Ferris' latest Friday essay from the subscriber who "started" it... Do you have a comment or question? As always, e-mail us at feedback@stansberryresearch.com.

"As the 'Scott H.' in the first sentence of Dan's Friday Digest, this will proudly go in my personal investing Hall of Fame (ancillary services category)! As always, another informative Digest from Dan." – Subscriber Scott H.

Corey McLaughlin comment: Happy to hear it, Scott!

All the best,

Corey McLaughlin with Nick Koziol
Baltimore, Maryland
June 24, 2025