Economic analysts smack down Trump’s claim that impeachment will wreck the economy

As the seriousness of the accusations against President Donald Trump continues to sink in, the president is scrambling to avoid the potential consequences, including impeachment proceedings.

On Thursday, Trump said that if he were impeached the stock market would crash. "Everybody would be very poor," he told Fox News.

In fact, only 54 percent of Americans invest in the stock market. But for those who are, would impeachment seriously rock the market? Bloomberg reporters spoke with economic analysts, who largely seemed to agree that while impeachment might create some short-term volatility, there would not be a permanent crash.

"If an impeachment did happen, we’d experience volatility and perhaps a significant selloff, but I believe any such market moves would be short-term in nature," said Kristina Hooper, chief global market strategist at Invesco Ltd. She also points out that Mike Pence would largely continue Trump's economic agenda.

Greg Valliere, chief global strategist at Horizon Investments LLC, said that the political controversies swirling around the Trump White House would only cause trouble if Trump himself were to do something crazy.

"It’s not a pretty picture here in Washington, but as long as Trump doesn’t go totally off the rails, investors can compartmentalize," he said.

"With two more Trump associates now facing jail time, chances have improved that the House will flip back to the Democrats, who in private concede that an impeachment debate probably will begin by late winter."

But he pointed out that an impeachment is not likely to get through the Senate, which requires 2/3rds of the vote to convict the president and remove him from office.

"But we’re sticking with our call -- while the House might indict Trump, Senate conviction still looks unlikely, unless there’s a major change in the second point.”