On Monday, April 7th, Jim Cramer opened the Mad Money episode with a message of calm in the midst of chaos. After nine straight lower openings and another bruising session for stocks, Cramer made it clear that while the pain is real. He acknowledged the likelihood of a recession but rejected the notion that we were on the brink of another global financial collapse, saying:
“Do we have a problem that’s systemic meaning there’s actual weakness in our a rot in our institutions that can’t easily be undone? Now my partner David Faber and I discussed this very point this morning and we agreed that we needed to take the financial crisis scenario off the table because our institutions are strong, and we don’t believe that the whole economic system is in jeopardy. We don’t believe that major banks will fail, we definitely don’t like this situation for heaven’s sake. It’s likely we’re headed for a recession because of the president’s ill-advised plans, but we’ll pull out of it one way or another. It’s not going to be the global financial crisis number two.”
READ ALSO: Jim Cramer Warns of a 36% Market Drop & Reviews These 9 Key Stocks and Jim Cramer’s Game Plan: 10 Stocks in Focus
Rather than being caused by inflation, interest rates, or even earnings weakness, Cramer insisted the market’s decline was driven by leadership decisions. He called the downturn “man-made,” emphasizing that it could be reversed just as easily as it began, if the administration changed course:
“Then we get back to the approximate cause of the decline: it’s all man-made! Wall Street’s terrified by the tariffs but we have an arbitrary material president who can declare victory, roll these tariffs back with the stroke of [inaudible] and then where would we be? We would have bought nothing. And at some point, the White House won’t be able to tolerate a crashing stock market.”
What concerned Cramer most was the deeper agenda behind the tariffs. In his view, the administration wasn’t just trying to rebalance trade but to reverse decades of globalization, forcing companies to return manufacturing to U.S. soil — even if that meant permanent economic disruption.
“The job isn’t just to coerce China; it’s to cause US manufacturers to come back here. Away from Vietnam, that’s why Vietnam had that huge tariff. Those are two agenda items that not just one that’s important it means there’s no possible negotiation because that would encourage companies not to come back here. Sure, the tariffs could raise some revenue or promote domestic manufacturing, but they can’t reverse history, and Trump wants to reverse history. It’s a tall order – an ill-advised one – he wants to do it quickly.”
Finally, Cramer laid out the daunting checklist of what would need to happen for the current strategy to succeed:
“There are many things that have to go right for Trump to successfully reorder the global economy in order to bring back domestic manufacturing and bring China to its knees. First the high tariffs can’t cause a spike in inflation or else the Fed won’t be able to bail us out with rate cuts. Second, he has to negotiate new trade deals very quickly for congressional members who are supposed to control the tariffs wake up. The lower the market goes the more likely the Republicans in Congress actually throw the president’s agenda under the bus. Third, he has to do it without causing a big spike in unemployment. I think if he does get all three, he isn’t going to press his bet with these tariffs, instead, he’ll find some reason to declare victory and roll them back. which is why the market didn’t collapse today.”
Our Methodology
For this article, we compiled a list of 15 stocks that were discussed by Jim Cramer during the episode of Mad Money aired on April 7. We listed the stocks in the order that Cramer mentioned them. We also provided hedge fund sentiment for each stock as of the fourth quarter of 2024, which was taken from Insider Monkey’s database of over 1,000 hedge funds.
Why are we interested in the stocks that hedge funds pile into? The reason is simple: our research has shown that we can outperform the market by imitating the top stock picks of the best hedge funds. Our quarterly newsletter’s strategy selects 14 small-cap and large-cap stocks every quarter and has returned 373.4% since May 2014, beating its benchmark by 218 percentage points (see more details here).
Jim Cramer Calls Market Decline ‘Man-Made’ and Breaks Down 15 Stocks
15. Cleveland-Cliffs Inc. (NYSE:CLF)
Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 49
A caller from Texas asked Jim whether the market was getting it wrong on Cleveland-Cliffs Inc. (NYSE:CLF), especially given the recent 30% drop. The caller noted that Trump’s steel tariffs should theoretically boost demand for domestic producers like CLF. Here’s what Jim Cramer replied with:
“I think the problem [with] Cleveland- it’s two problems, one is the balance sheet’s not that good, and two, there’s got to be demand. If the auto companies are really cutting back – and I think you’re gonna have to after the initial spur – that is going to make it so that the the numbers have to go lower. If the numbers go lower, Cleveland Cliffs and the stock’s going to go to 65.”
In February this year, Jim Cramer expressed some concerns again about Cleveland-Cliffs Inc. (NYSE:CLF) and the company’s exposure to Mexican imports, saying:
“I also care about Cleveland-Cliffs so when it reports as this steel company has been beaten up by cheap exports from China via Mexico transshipment, they call it, I worry about how it’s doing, whether the US can actually stop these darn subsidized transshipped imports.”
14. Coinbase Global, Inc. (NASDAQ:COIN)
Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 69
A caller speculated that the macro uncertainty from tariffs might boost demand for Bitcoin and asked whether Coinbase Global, Inc. (NASDAQ:COIN) might benefit. Cramer used the opportunity to clarify his view on crypto exposure, saying:
“Not a bad idea, Bitcoin’s down a lot, but why don’t you do this, why don’t you buy Bitcoin? Why buy Coinbase? You can just go buy Bitcoin. And I think that’s a good idea all the way down here. I prefer that to actually buying Coinbase.”
Patient Capital Management stated the following regarding Coinbase Global, Inc. (NASDAQ:COIN) in its Q4 2024 investor letter:
“The top performers in the fourth quarter were once again Financials and Travel names. We’ve been over-indexed to them since the pandemic, which has served us well. We strategically added to certain financial names like Sofi Technologies (SOFI) and Coinbase Global, Inc. (NASDAQ:COIN) during the year. Both companies rebounded strongly in the fourth quarter. We believe Coinbase is building the platform for the crypto ecosystem. Certain recent advances (wallet, base improvements, USD Coin) could cause an adoption tipping point. We like that Coinbase continues to widen its moat by persistently investing in innovation.”
Hedge Fund Resource Center