President Donald Trump's Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent doesn't appear to understand the basics of how the stock market works, analyst Natasha Sarin told CNN's Boris Sanchez and Brianna Keilar on Monday afternoon.
Trump's imposition of tariffs on goods purchased from virtually every country in the world has resulted in plunging stock prices both at home and abroad, leaving officials in the Trump administration scrambling to explain it away as "short-term" pain that is part of a more long-term economic transition. Trump himself took to his Truth Social platform to demand people not be "stupid" and stay calm about the financial impact of his tariffs.
"Scott Bessent is downplaying losses in the stock market, saying the administration is focused on building out the long-term economic fundamentals for prosperity," said Sanchez. "What do you make of this promise from the administration that this is all about the long term, don't panic when you see markets afflicted the way they have been?"
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"The thing about that sort of argument is it really doesn't make any sense," said Sarin. "And it reflects, like, a misunderstanding of what the stock market is telling us. The stock market, and the market reaction, tells you what the view is of the long-term prospects of these companies. It tells you what the view is of this trade war and what its likely impacts are going to be on households who are going to pay thousands of dollars more a year, but also on American firms and on American investment, where sort of betting on this country and investing in this country is getting less sustainable and less desirable in ways that are going to eat at the American economy, not just today, tomorrow, the next month, but literally for years to come."
"So, Natasha, what's your reaction when Bessent says he's been very impressed with the market infrastructure and pointed to the record volume the market's had on Friday?" asked Keilar.
"You know, it is the last three days have been the worst three days of stock market performance that this country has seen since at least the financial crisis," said Sarin. "So it is hard to, I mean, to take joy in the fact that there has been a lot of trading volume as people are looking to sell off in a world in which they're no longer sure that the United States and the American economy are really going to be the envy of the world. They have been historically — isn't really sort of a cheerleading point, from my perspective."
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