Billionaire entrepreneur Mark Cuban believes companies will waste no time spending their first available dollars on stock buybacks.
In a post shared early Saturday morning, Cuban wrote, “Is there any doubt that the first dollar out the door from companies will be to buy back their stock? It’s the only certain investment available to them.”
Stock Buybacks Take Priority
Cuban’s comment highlights what he sees as a predictable corporate strategy amid economic uncertainty.
His remarks came amid broader questions about the U.S. economy and how government policies are affecting markets.
One user asked about President Donald Trump’s tariffs and whether Republicans in Congress might try to reclaim trade policy power.
Cuban was noncommittal: “I don’t know. I can see him backing down and I can see him not caring.”
Criticism of Spending Cuts and Tariffs
Roughly an hour later, Cuban expanded on his concerns about the current state of the U.S. economy, particularly how federal spending cuts and tariffs are playing out together.
“Well we can’t grow our way out of it anymore,” he said, referring to the $36 trillion national debt. “We need to reduce interest rates. That reduces how much we pay in interest.”
Cuban expressed support for the concept of reducing government spending—commonly referred to online as “DOGE cuts”—but strongly criticized how they’ve been implemented.
“The concept of DOGE is right on. We need to cut spending. The implementation has been horrific,” he wrote.
He argued that these cuts should have been rolled out gradually over two years to avoid shocking the economy and to give affected workers and communities time to adjust.
“Doing them all at once is destructive, particularly to smaller cities and states who depend on fed dollars,” he said.
Tariffs Make It Worse
Cuban also noted that combining these spending cuts with steep tariffs has only made matters worse.
“Once tariffs went up so much, when combined with the simultaneous DOGE Cuts, it was inevitable that we would see carnage,” he wrote.
Tariffs, he added, are inflationary, which in turn limits the Federal Reserve’s ability to cut interest rates.
“So whatever gains we may have gotten from DOGE were taken in lost net worth, tax receipts and consumer buying power.”
Brokerages Raise Recession Odds
Cuban’s warnings come as global brokerages sound the alarm on rising recession risks.
JPMorgan raised its U.S. and global recession odds to 60%, up from a previous estimate of 40%, citing escalating trade tensions and weakening business sentiment.
“Disruptive U.S. policies have been recognized as the biggest risk to the global outlook all year,” JPMorgan said in a note.
S&P Global lifted its subjective probability of a U.S. recession to between 30% and 35%, up from 25% in March.
Goldman Sachs made a similar adjustment last week, increasing its recession estimate to 35% from 20%, even before Trump’s latest tariff announcement.
Barclays, Bank of America, Deutsche Bank, and UBS also warned that the U.S. economy could slip into contraction if tariffs remain in place.
Meanwhile, several firms slashed their year-end targets for the S&P 500. UBS downgraded its outlook on U.S. equities from “attractive” to “neutral,” and Capital Economics cut its S&P 500 index target to 5,500—the lowest among major brokerages.
Taken together, Cuban’s posts suggest a view that companies are retreating to the safest available financial plays, like buybacks, while government policy is undercutting broader economic stability.
IMAGE CREDIT: “Mark Cuban” by Gage Skidmore, via Flickr. Licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0. Image adjusted for layout.