Market Beats | Trump Buys Over $100M in Bonds; Fed Chair Contender Zervos: The Fed Has Never Been Independent, Powell Leaned Left; Citi Probed Wealth Chief Andy Sieg After Multiple Senior Complaints; FTC Sues LA Fitness Over “Onerous” Cancellation Policies; Judge Blocks Release of Jeffrey Epstein Grand Jury Transcript; Pension Funds and Family Offices Push Back Against Hedge Fund Fees

—— Trump Buys Over $100M in Bonds; Fed Chair Contender Zervos: The Fed Has Never Been Independent, Powell Leaned Left; Citi Probed Wealth Chief Andy Sieg After Multiple Senior Complaints; FTC Sues LA Fitness Over “Onerous” Cancellation Policies; Judge Blocks Release of Jeffrey Epstein Grand Jury Transcript; Pension Funds and Family Offices Push Back Against Hedge Fund Fees

1. Trump Buys Over $100M in Bonds

President Donald Trump has purchased at least $103.7 million worth of bonds since returning to office, according to a White House disclosure released Tuesday. The 690 transactions, starting the day after his inauguration, include both municipal and corporate debt.

On February 10, Trump bought at least $500,000 in bonds from Qualcomm, Home Depot, and T-Mobile US. Later that month, he acquired at least $250,000 of debt from Meta Platforms Inc. The investments also span municipal bonds issued by local governments, airport authorities, school boards, and gas districts.

The disclosures do not provide exact amounts or prices, only broad transaction ranges, and show that Trump reported no sales. With a net worth estimated at $6.4 billion by Bloomberg, the president continues to actively build wealth while in office.

Unlike his predecessors, Trump has not divested or placed his assets in a blind trust. Instead, his business empire remains under the management of his two sons and operates across industries closely tied to federal policy.

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2. Fed Chair Contender Zervos: The Fed Has Never Been Independent, Powell Leaned Left

David Zervos, a potential candidate to succeed Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, said it’s inaccurate to describe the Fed as independent and characterized Powell as aligned with the political left.

“The Fed has never been independent, and the political pressures on the Fed have always been growing and continue to grow,” Zervos, chief market strategist at Jefferies, said on CNBC. He pointed to pressure from Democratic lawmakers in recent years to push for lower interest rates.

He added that history is full of episodes where Treasury secretaries and administrations sought to influence Fed chairs “behind the scenes.”

CNBC reported last week that Zervos is among private-sector candidates being considered by President Donald Trump to take over the central bank. He began his career as an economist at the Fed before moving to Wall Street.

As for Powell, Zervos said he believed the outgoing chair did resist many “crazy” initiatives under President Joe Biden, such as stronger financial regulation and “woke stuff.” But he criticized Powell for failing to engage in the fiscal debate at a time when government spending was surging.

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3. Citi Probed Wealth Chief Andy Sieg After Multiple Senior Complaints

Citigroup Inc. hired law firm Paul Weiss to investigate complaints about the behavior of its wealth-management head, Andy Sieg, a high-profile hire by CEO Jane Fraser. Since joining nearly two years ago, Sieg has faced allegations from current and former employees of intimidation and unfairly sidelining staff, according to people familiar with the matter.

The inquiry was requested by Citigroup’s human-resources chief Sara Wechter and also reviewed by the board, led by Chairman John Dugan, which had received anonymous complaints about Sieg’s conduct at Citi and earlier in his career. The Paul Weiss probe, which has now concluded, interviewed more than a dozen people, including at least six managing directors. Some complaints specifically focused on Sieg’s treatment of Ida Liu, the longtime head of Citi’s private bank who departed in January after 18 years, and Kristen Bitterly, another senior wealth executive.

The bank declined to comment on the probe’s outcome, and Sieg did not respond to requests for comment. Several of the executives who complained are no longer with Citigroup.

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4. FTC Sues LA Fitness Over “Onerous” Cancellation Policies

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) filed a lawsuit Wednesday against LA Fitness in federal court in Los Angeles, accusing the gym chain of deliberately making it difficult for customers to cancel memberships. The agency said the practices allowed the company to keep collecting hundreds of millions of dollars in fees that members would have otherwise stopped paying.

According to the FTC, cancellation was often restricted to specific times or required speaking with certain managers who were frequently unavailable. LA Fitness, operated by Fitness International LLC and Fitness & Sports Club LLC, has about 600 locations and roughly 3.7 million members, with membership costs ranging from $30 to $299 per month depending on location and add-ons.

The case marks the second brought by the Trump administration against overly burdensome cancellation practices. Earlier this year, the FTC sued Uber over cancellation difficulties with its Uber One subscription.

Under the Biden administration, the agency also sued Amazon and Adobe over similar practices and advanced new rules requiring companies to make subscription cancellations easier. However, business groups challenged the regulation, and a federal appeals court blocked it in July.

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5. Judge Blocks Release of Jeffrey Epstein Grand Jury Transcript

US District Judge Richard Berman in Manhattan on Wednesday denied the Justice Department’s request to release the grand jury transcript from Jeffrey Epstein’s 2019 sex trafficking indictment, marking another setback for the Trump administration’s push to satisfy public demand for more transparency.

Berman ruled that no “special circumstances” justified unsealing the records, noting that the government already possesses a “trove” of interviews, exhibits, and other documents it has pledged to share publicly. He emphasized that grand jury secrecy is vital to protect victims and prevent investigation targets from fleeing, and courts typically reject such disclosure requests.

Earlier this month, another judge also denied the administration’s motion to unseal transcripts in the case against Epstein’s former partner, Ghislaine Maxwell, who was convicted in 2021 and is serving a 20-year prison sentence. Berman wrote that the grand jury testimony was merely a “hearsay snippet” compared with the broader “Epstein Files” in the government’s possession.

The Justice Department acknowledged that only two law enforcement officers testified before the grand jury, and many of the victims referenced later testified publicly at Maxwell’s trial and in civil suits. Even if released, the transcript would have likely been heavily redacted to exclude information about third parties not charged or connected to Epstein’s crimes.

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6. Pension Funds and Family Offices Push Back Against Hedge Fund Fees

Hedge fund investors are beginning to rebel against what they see as excessive and opaque costs, with several major institutions refusing to accept fee structures that take too much of their profits.

The $200 billion Teacher Retirement System of Texas, New Mexico’s $17 billion Public Employees Retirement Association, and multifamily office Erlen Capital Management are among those rejecting funds that levy so-called passthrough fees. These fees cover nearly all of a hedge fund’s operating costs — from rent and travel to multimillion-dollar executive pay — and can run into the billions on top of the industry-standard 20% performance fee and sometimes a 2% management charge.

Such fees are particularly common among multistrategy hedge funds, or “pod shops.” Investors are demanding greater transparency and insisting on minimum profit retention. New Mexico and Erlen have set a 60% cutoff: if they take home less than that share of returns after fees, they won’t invest. Texas’s pension fund looks for at least 70%.

“If you’re taking more than half of the profits, we won’t even talk to you,” said Michael Shackelford, CIO of New Mexico’s pension fund, noting that many fund pitches are being rejected.

Prominent firms known to use passthrough fees include Millennium Management, Citadel, Point72 Asset Management, Balyasny Asset Management, and ExodusPoint Capital Management.

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7. Novo Nordisk Cuts Ozempic Cash Price to $499

Novo Nordisk is cutting the cost of its blockbuster diabetes drug Ozempic for cash-paying patients, amid ongoing scrutiny of high US drug prices.

The Danish pharmaceutical giant said Monday that patients can now get Ozempic for $499 a month — roughly half of its US list price — through its NovoCare cash-pay pharmacy. In addition, the company is partnering with GoodRx to make both Ozempic and its weight-loss counterpart Wegovy available at the same price at pharmacies nationwide.

The move comes as President Donald Trump has been pressuring drugmakers, including sending letters to companies like Novo, to take action on pricing. Previous efforts by the Biden administration to push for lower prices were unsuccessful. Novo stressed that this offer is unrelated to its government discussions.

GoodRx CEO Wendy Barnes said the collaboration would give patients easier access to more affordable versions of the drugs: “We already have millions of consumers searching for these products, and this partnership puts the most affordable options in their hands.”

Shares of Novo Nordisk jumped as much as 7.8% following the news, while GoodRx stock soared 39% — its biggest one-day gain since September 2020.

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