Tariff Turmoil: Top 10 Stocks on Sale (April 2025)
The market has been primed for a correction for quite some time (e.g. valuations were rich and investors were overconfident in continuing high growth), and President Trump just pushed stocks over the edge with his draconian tariffs. We don’t know when the selloff will end, but we can estimate the three phases of this trade war. We can also say with significant confidence, the economy is still growing, and stocks will eventually trade higher (likely much higher). In this report, we countdown our top 10 highly-attractive stock rankings, which includes an alternating mix of high-growth and high-income opportunities, to help you customize your portfolio to take full advantage of the impressive opportunities being created by this rip-your-face-off market correction.
3 Phases of the New Trade War
As you can see in the chart above, it didn’t take long for stocks to give back their gains from the previous year, as bonds (an assets class that was ridiculed as obsolete a few months ago) are now leading stocks in performance over the last year.
Phase 1: Liberation Day: Phase 1 of this trade war is President Trump announcing massive tariffs against international trading partners (most of whom which the US has a trade deficit). And of course, the hideous market selloff that just accelerated to frightening speed over the last few trading sessions. A case can be made that phase 1 has been going on for decades as foreign countries take advantage of US wealth, but no one can dispute Trump just whipped the trade war into high gear with his newly announced tariffs.
Phase 2: Concessions and Economic Damage: Phase 2 of the trade war will be the concessions and economic-destruction period. This will include a wide range of concessions and timeframes as the US renegotiates trading terms (tariffs) with foreign countries. Real economic damage will likely occur during this phase, as costs rise for US consumers, economic growth slows, and the declines we have experienced in the stock market so far likely reflect true value destruction that will occur as a result of the tariffs (as we wrote about here).
Regarding concessions, some will occur quickly, and be mostly meaningless, but the US President will most certainly tout them as big wins. Some concessions will happen slowly, and the value of the changes will be economically ambiguous (but again, there will be a lot of “victory lapping” from the US President).
The most important parts of phase 2 will be trade negotiations with large trading partners like China, Canada and Mexico. Mexico will likely be the quickest and most reasonable (because they are the most reasonable). Canada will likely be a lot friendlier (especially in their rhetoric) following their upcoming election at the end of April. China will be the least reasonable, simply because they are the most culturally different (i.e. they are communist, and they don’t really believe in things like “property rights” or “the American Dream”).
At the end of phase 2 (when most of the so called “concessions” have been made), real near-term economic damage will have been done, the long-term economics may actually be slightly improved for the US (in terms of trade deficits), and the US President will proclaim huge victory.
Phase 3: Relapse: Over time, less wealthy countries will creep back into taking economic advantage of the US, especially China (a country the doesn’t believe in property rights or Western values). However, phase 3 will also bring less uncertainty, less market volatility and healthy stock market gains (building off a new, albeit lower, base).
Whether we are closer to the beginning or end of the tariff selloff is uncertain, but stocks are certainly trading a lot lower than they were. And over the long-term they will likely be trading a lot higher than they are now.
So with that backdrop in mind, let’s get into our top 10 ranking of highly-attractive stocks, which includes an alternating mix of high-growth and high-income opportunities for you to consider (based on your own individual and unique situation and goals).
10. Nvidia (NVDA)
Nvidia is a highly-attractive growth stock that gets a lot of attention and that is currently trading down big. Nvidia is in the center of both the AI megatrend and the Trump Trade War. Regarding the former, Nvidia GPU chips are ground zero for AI processing (i.e. they are the premier chips and they are in extremely high demand—a really good thing). And regarding the trade war, the US has already placed international trade restrictions on Nvidia chips for national security reasons, and the new trade war has caused the shares to fall very hard as international sales may be restricted even dramatically more (i.e. less international sales for Nvidia).
Also, even though Nvidia is a US company, its chips (e.g. Blackwell) are largely produced by Taiwan Semiconductor in Taiwan, which complicates tariff considerations, especially because of ongoing disputes about Taiwan’s independence from China (China thinks they own Taiwan, Taiwan and the US disagree).
We recently wrote about Nvidia in detail here. But the bottom line is Nvidia is an extremely attractive long-term growth business, trading at a very compelling price and valuation (especially after the sharp trade war selloff), and if you are a patient long-term investor, Nvidia shares will likely eventually be trading dramatically higher than they are now.
9. Ares Capital (ARCC):
Switching gears to highly-attractive high-income opportunities, Ares Capital offers a big 9.6% dividend yield, and the shares just sold off sharply (and the price-to-book valuation has come down to approximately 1.0x or par—a good thing).
Ares basically makes loans to private companies, and the Trump trade war threatens this business because an economic slowdown increases the chances that the private companies Ares lends to won’t be able to pay back the loans. For example, credit spreads (or the difference in interest rates between safe loans, such as treasuries, and riskier high-yield loans, such as the ones Ares makes) just widened significantly. However, as a general rule, this makes Ares a more attractive investment opportunity because widening spreads have caused the valuation and price to fall (buy low) as long as you don’t think the sky is falling (i.e. as long as the Trump tariffs don’t completely destroy the economy—which we are banking on “they will not”). Said differently, the sell off in Ares just created a more attractive opportunity to pick up shares of this big-yield BDC (if you are into big yields).
8. SuperMicro Computer (SMCI):
Switching gears back to highly-attractive, high-growth companies, SuperMicro is also benefiting from explosive growth in the AI megatrend (SuperMicro basically makes servers that house Nvidia chips, as we wrote about here), but has also sold off extremely hard as the trade war threatens international sales and economic growth in general.
Further complicated the SuperMicro situation (or actually making it an even better “buy low” opportunity) the shares trade at an even more extremely low valuation following the resignation (and recent replacement) of its auditor (which delayed the reporting of its financials). But with the new auditor in place, and the AI megatrend likely to persist despite trade war challenges (we don’t believe the trade war will end the global economy—not even close), SuperMicro shares are trading way too low, and the price should eventually go much high (from both multiple expansion and continuing long-term revenue growth).
7. Vanguard Total Bond Market ETF (BND):
For all the people who were proclaiming bonds were “dead” after the horrible post-covid bond ETF crash (as rates were increased rapidly by the fed to combat inflation created by excessive stimulus, bond price fell hard). However, if the Tariff War Selloff accelerates bonds provide the double benefit of being a flight-to-safety asset class (whereby investors pile in and drive the price up), but also if the fed is forced to eventually cut interest rates even faster than hawkish chair Powell has been talking (which is virtually inevitable if the economy gets bad) then bond prices (and this ETF’s price) will rise. Also worth mentioning, considering the US government’s high debt, the Fed cannot realistically increase bond prices that much (which would be bad for bond ETFs) because it would crush the US under the weight of increased interest payments on its own massive debt. Despite popular opinion that bond funds are somehow dead—they’re not. And BND is an attractive diversifier against the risk of stocks that also happens to offer a decent 3.7% yield and the potential for price appreciation too.
6. Texas Pacific Land Corp (TPL)
This is another company with significant share price appreciation potential. This is a unique play in the oil and gas industry (which just sold off hard on fears of a trade-war-induced economic slowdown). TPL owns “tons” (a technical term) of land in the West Texas Permian Basin, and then leases it to companies for oil and gas production (so it doesn’t have any significant operational costs or risks—it basically just collects royalties from the companies it leases the land to). TPL shares were down big, in sympathy with the entire energy industry, but it can weather economic challenges much easier than companies that actually have to spend money on all the machinery and equipment to produce oil and gas. We wrote this one up in more detail here.
5. PIMCO Dynamic Income Opportunities Fund (PDO)
This big yield closed-end fund was doing great all year (unlike most of the rest of the market) but just sold off hard in the last few trading sessions.
It seems the share price of this 11.2% yield, monthly-pay, bond fund got hit with the double whammy of credit spreads widening (they own a lot of high-yield bonds) and Fed chair Jerome Powell thumbing his nose at Trump by claiming he’s in no hurry to lower interest rates as inflation is still a concern (cutting rates will increase the price of PDI—a bond fund—because of its positive duration—or interest rate risk). PDO trades at a modest 6% premium to NAV (compelling for a top PIMCO bond fund). And again, the shares were doing great all year, and the steep price decline provides a more attractive entry point for investors.
The Top 4
The top 4 ideas is reserved for subscribers only, and it can be accessed here. It actually includes more than just 4 ideas, and it is an attractive mix of high-growth and high-income opportunities, on sale, and highly attractive right now.
The Bottom Line:
President Trump is a bold loud mouth who is trying to improve the US economy by reducing trade deficits through tariffs. The recently announced tariffs will absolutely do harm to the US economy in the short term (if they are implemented) and the face-ripper stock market declines we have experienced (and that may continue) are already pricing in a significant amount of economic value destruction.
In the long-term, Trump’s efforts may incrementally improve the trade deficit and the US economy, although we can say with a high degree of certainty Trump will brag about the “success” of these tariffs no matter what.
We can also say with a high degree of certainty, the US (and global) economies are resilient and growing, and over the long term they will likely pull stock prices higher (and probably dramatically higher).
We also know that the stock prices of highly-attractive businesses (both high growth and high income) are now lower than they were, and significantly more attractive in select instances, such as those highlighted in this report (although trying to exactly call the bottom is a fool’s errand).
Rather, disciplined, goal-focused, long-term investing continues to be a winning strategy. And at the end of the day, you need to do what is right for you (based on your own unique situation). And if you buy attractive stocks now—you will be getting a much better price than you were a few days ago.