This is 100% part of the equation.
It's difficult to tell if it's the main goal, or just a profitable side benefit.
As fucked up as the idea of an American president willfully manipulating the market to enrich himself and his cronies is, it's a lot better than the alternative, which is that he is actively trying to destroy the global economy, probably because he is a full-blown Russian asset. Who wins if there is a worldwide great depression? If all anyone can afford is the basics, and China controls manufacturing, and Russia controls starvation (aren't Russia and Ukraine the two largest wheat exporters in the world?), and the West's wealth is evaporating because a lot of is paper and real estate, yeah, it's a new world, and quickly.
It's also difficult to tell how much of this is part of some grand conspiracy and how much is simply the fact that Donald Trump is a Stage 5 Idiot and no one else in the room will speak truth to power. Every time this race car hits the wall, it's hard to tell if it's malicious or just because there's a god damned 5-year-old at the wheel.