MORE LIKE THIS, PLEASE: ‘There’ll Be Consequences’: Trump WH Warns Defense Contractors.

While the president loves a booming market, Trump has grown frustrated with prime defense contractors – heavy-weight companies with direct Pentagon contracts and Fortune 500 valuations – rewarding shareholders rather than reinvesting profits into their manufacturing capacity even as they fall behind in the delivery of weapons and systems.

“This situation,” Trump wrote in a TruthSocial post, “will no longer be allowed or tolerated!” He then issued an executive order that threatens to limit dividends, stock buybacks, and CEO pay.

One month later, the stock price of all five of the prime defense contractors – Boeing, General Dynamics, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, and RTX – have all rebounded. None, however, have made new commitments on paying dividends, and just one company, Northrop Grumman, manufacturer of the new B-21 Stealth Bomber, has publicly announced that they plan to pause stock buybacks.

But that does not mean Trump isn’t getting his way. The saber-rattling seems to be working. Defense contractors are expected to increase reinvestment, spending capital on their own manufacturing capacity, by more than a third this year.

Nope, still not sick of all the winning.