President’s Trump’s threats of trade wars could redound to the detriment of everyone around the globe, according to a panel of money managers.
Perpetual U.S red ink combined with threatened policies of autarky adopted by the United States and major trading partners could ruin the gains of world trade that have helped raise living standards around the world, panelists agreed. Indeed, they said that the world has dramatically benefited from the post-World War II environment of free trade. A tariff war waged by most economic powers would be disastrous, they said.
Those were among the comments at a panel on economics and politics in Manhattan on Thursday at the UBS CIO Global Forum presided over by Paul Donovan, chief economist at UBS Global Wealth Management.
“Protectionism is such a disastrous economic policy,” warned David Kelly, chief global strategist at JPMorgan Asset Morgan. “And it is almost like communism. I don’t think it can survive.”
Much of American prosperity, as well as that of the rest of the world, benefits from an environment of free trade, said Tom McLoughlin, head of U.S. municipal fixed-income research at UBS. “One in five jobs in the United States is tied to trade,” he said.
Another danger to the United States and other welfare state democracies, panelists noted, is the United States budget deficit, which will hit a trillion dollars in the latest fiscal year. Noting that corporate and personal debt levels are also high, Kelly warned these developments could make the economy vulnerable to shocks. This might be caused by a slowdown in the business cycle.
Matt McLennan, a global value portfolio manager at First Eagle, added that record low unemployment rates suggest that the strongest part of the recovery is over.
Kelly said sovereign debt is becoming an issue, with “pockets of vulnerability, whether it is Argentina, Turkey and not just Italy. There are a lot of currencies under extreme pressure around the world.”
Could the U.S. someday have a sovereign debt problem?
Several panelists said yes, but not in the short run.