Emmanuel Macron’s eye injury in Switzerland is moving markets. The French president appeared at the World Economic Forum annual meeting in mirrored aviator sunglasses reminiscent of the Top Gun aviator movie franchise, amusing President Donald Trump and social media, and propelling an obscure Italian eyewear stock into the spotlight, lifting its value by nearly 30% in a matter of days. The surge underscores how a viral political image can reverberate far beyond social media, reshaping the fortunes of a small-cap company almost overnight.
Macron appeared at Davos this week, wearing reflective aviator-style sunglasses, to deliver a high-profile speech to global political and business leaders in the Swiss resort town. The look, strikingly reminiscent of Tom Cruise’s fighter-pilot persona in the 1986 film Top Gun, quickly dominated coverage and commentary around his appearance. Clips and images of the French president in the mirrored glasses spread rapidly on X, Instagram, TikTok, and news sites, with memes and side‑by‑side comparisons casting him as a swaggering pilot rather than a buttoned-up technocrat.
Onstage during his speech, Trump even joked at his onetime handshake-rival‘s new look: “I watched him yesterday with his beautiful sunglasses. I said, ‘What the hell happened?’” Trump later went on a tangent about Macron’s approach to drug-price policy before adding, “I actually like him. I do.”
