John Authers, Columnist

The Midterm Election Stars Are Aligning for Staples

Trump’s need to help lower-paid voters may propel a buying opportunity.

December 3, 2025 at 4:00 AM UTC

John Authers is a senior editor for markets and Bloomberg Opinion columnist. A former chief markets commentator at the Financial Times, he is author of “The Fearful Rise of Markets.”

Shoppers at Walmart on Black Friday.
Photographer: Brian Kaiser/Bloomberg

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Is it time for consumer staples to stage a revival? The big companies selling basic necessities tend to shine when the rest of the market is in trouble. Famously, Walmart Inc. was the only firm of any size whose share price was higher when the market troughed after the Global Financial Crisis in 2009 than it had been at the market peak in 2007. This year, US staples shone amid the alarm around the Liberation Day tariffs, and have suffered unremitting underperformance ever since: