Happy New Year 2025

Tag: fiscal

  • White House economist teases the ‘biggest’ fiscal reform ‘America has ever seen’

    White House economist teases the ‘biggest’ fiscal reform ‘America has ever seen’

    National Economic Council director Kevin Hassett analyzes the impact of President Donald Trump’s tariffs on ‘Kudlow.’

    President Donald Trump’s economic plans are being set into motion, according to one of the newest top White House officials, who believes America will see the “biggest” fiscal reform on trade, energy, regulations and tax and spending cuts.

    “When the people who are trying to cause panic over President Trump’s trade policy simulate what it’s going to do, they don’t account for all the other policies. So President Trump is drill, baby, drill and deregulate and tax cuts and reduce spending,” National Economic Council director Kevin Hassett said in an exclusive interview on “Kudlow,” Monday.

    “And if you look at tariffs as part of an overall strategy, you’re going to see, as President Trump says, a golden age,” he added. “And it’s going to be the biggest supply side reform that America has ever seen.”

    On the presidential campaign trail, Trump repeatedly proposed tariffs on trade countries like Mexico, Canada, China and others to be used more as a negotiation tactic. This proved to work earlier this week when Colombian President Gustavo Petro swiftly backtracked on his refusal to accept deportation flights from the United States after Trump threatened tariffs and other measures.

    ODDS OF U.S. RECESSION DECLINING: N.A.B.E. ECONOMISTS

    “I think that you saw from the Colombia negotiation that the president is going to use tariffs if he needs to, in order to get people to make policy concessions that are good for America, that put America first,” Hassett reacted.

    National Economic Council director Kevin Hassett talks President Trump’s top fiscal priorities, from taxes and tariffs to AI and energy. (Getty Images)

    “The bottom line is that a tariff isn’t necessarily just a weapon, but economically, if you do the math, a tariff can be part of a supply side strategy that includes a big tax bill as well,” the director continued, while confirming that a universal tariff is something that Trump and House lawmakers will “negotiate” in a reconciliation bill.

    Also under reconciliation negotiations is the 15% corporate tax rate, which currently sits at 21%.

    Hassett also emphasized the impact that domestic energy and gas production has on minimizing inflation, claiming Wall Street analysts had hypothesized wrongly about the extra costs of Trump’s economy.

     Trump senior advisor for trade and manufacturing Peter Navarro discusses the battle over TikTok and bringing ‘prosperity’ to the United States on ‘The Claman Countdown.’

    “If you spend $1.5 trillion a year more on government spending, you’re going to get inflation. If you don’t let people drill, baby, drill, energy prices are going to go up… If you do, as Biden did over the last couple of years, kill 130 million chickens, then egg prices are going to go up. So the fact is that we’re doing micro things correctly, deregulatory things correctly, and we’re going to get the macro stuff right, too,” he argued.

    The newly appointed economic director also pointed out: “Inflation under Joe Biden was just under 5% for his whole term, about a little bit less than it was under Jimmy Carter and way more than double what it was under President Trump. And we’re 100% on the ball going after inflation, but it’s going to require an all-of-the-above approach. And right now, we’ve inherited really high inflation.”

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    Poland President Andrzej Duda joins ‘Mornings with Maria’ at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland to discuss the impact Trump’s presidency will have on the global economy.

    Trump is also aware of the artificial intelligence (AI) race’s future impacts on the economy, according to Hassett, but remains immediately focused on reversing consequential effects from Biden’s “reckless spending.”

    “One of the really fun things in the last week… is to walk around and to see the DOGE people, to see Elon Musk in the halls and to see all the great ideas that people have to make sure that Americans are not seeing their money wasted by a wasteful government,” he said. “There’s a heck of a lot for our team to fix, and I think we’re very optimistic about our ability to rein in spending.”

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    Fox News staff contributed to this report.

  • Trump’s fiscal clean-up job won’t be easy

    Trump’s fiscal clean-up job won’t be easy

    FOX Business contributor Gary Kaltbaum reacts to President Donald Trump declaring a ‘golden age’ in America on ‘Making Money.’

    President Donald Trump was sworn in amid much fanfare and celebration, and got straight to work on Monday. He started with a hiring freeze for federal workers and a regulatory freeze as part of a slew of executive orders, but taming the U.S. fiscal situation may prove more challenging. 

    “The biggest headwind is probably the massive debt and the very, very bloated budget, a lot of which contains spending. It’s money that hasn’t actually been spent at this point but is still slated to go out the door. You know, promises of future spending. So that’s going to be very, very problematic,” EJ Antoni, research fellow at The Heritage Foundation, told FOX Business before Trump took office. 

    President Donald Trump sings a second executive order during the inaugural parade inside Capital One Arena on the inauguration day of his second presidential term in Washington, D.C., on Monday.  (Reuters/Carlos Barria / Reuters)

    The national debt — which measures what the U.S. owes its creditors — is sitting above $36 trillion and growing, as tracked by the U.S. Treasury Department. 

    PRESIDENT TRUMP’S KEY FISCAL DEADLINES

    As for the budget, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) on Friday released its latest 10-year budget and economic outlook, which showed the federal government is on track to break a debt record set nearly 80 years ago.

    MELANIA TRUMP STUNS IN AMERICAN DESIGNERS

    “From 2025 to 2035, debt rises as increases in spending on Social Security, Medicare and interest payments outpace growth in revenues,” CBO Director Phillip Swagel told reporters.

    The federal government is projected to run a $1.9 trillion budget deficit in fiscal year 2025. The deficit is projected to briefly decline in the next two years before resuming its rise. The short-lived drop is tied to the expiration of portions of Trump’s 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, which expires at the end of this year. However, Trump’s treasury pick, Scott Bessent, is vowing not to let that happen. Bessent is expected to sail through the confirmation process.

    SCOTT BESSENT VOWS TO MAKE 2017 TAX CUTS PERMANENT

    Scott Bessent, President Donald Trump’s nominee to be treasury secretary, testifies during his Senate Finance Committee confirmation hearing in Dirksen building in Washington, D.C., on Thursday.  (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images / Getty Images)

    “We must make permanent the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act and implement new pro-growth policies to reduce the tax burden on American manufacturers, service workers and seniors,” Bessent told the Senate Finance Committee at his confirmation hearing. “President Trump was the first president in modern times to recognize the need to change our trade policy and stand up for American workers.”

    Donald Trump reviews the troops during his Inauguration ceremony

    President Donald Trump reviews the troops during his Inauguration ceremony in Emancipation Hall of the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., on Monday. (Greg Nash/Pool/AFP via Getty Images / Getty Images)

    The CBO’s analysis is based on current law, so changes to federal tax and spending policies could alter those figures.

    Another devil in disguise: the Federal Reserve’s easing cycle aimed at tackling inflation. Policymakers cut rates three times in 2024, a 50-basis-point cut, followed by two quarter-point moves. Still, the 10-year Treasury yield, which sets rates for several borrowing metrics including mortgage rates, remains above 4%. Mortgage rates just topped 7%, according to Freddie Mac, rising for the fifth straight week. 

    Investors did celebrate the latest consumer price index reading, which held no surprises. The core rate, which excludes volatile food and energy, rose 3.2% in December on an annual basis, less than the 3.3% economists had expected. At the Fed’s first meeting of the year, on Jan. 29, market participants expect no change, according to the CME’s FedWatch Tool. 

    Ticker Security Last Change Change %
    BNO UNITED STATES BRENT OIL FUND – USD ACC 31.98 -0.20 -0.64%
    USO UNITED STATES OIL FUND – USD ACC 80.42 -0.68 -0.84%
    GLD SPDR GOLD SHARES TRUST – USD ACC 254.38 +1.29 +0.51%

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    Still, inflation remains a wild card. Nymex and Brent crude have gained more than 8% this year, and gold is trading just under its all-time high of $2,788.50 an ounce. 

  • Major bank CEO says Trump’s fiscal policies makes US ‘the No. 1 place to invest’ again

    Major bank CEO says Trump’s fiscal policies makes US ‘the No. 1 place to invest’ again

    Bank of America Chairman and CEO Brian Moynihan talks anticipating policy and regulation changes, the economic future in 2025, bank growth, rate trajectory and investment in artificial intelligence.

    From mergers and acquisitions to deregulation and “competitive” tax structure, Bank of America’s top executive shared an optimistic picture of the U.S. economy under the second Trump administration.

    “When you talk to the people around here, from all over the world, [in] business, it’s the No. 1 place to invest. Not by a little bit, by a lot,” BofA Chairman and CEO Brian Moynihan said of America’s economic landscape during a “Mornings with Maria” interview from the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.

    “If you go back to the first Trump administration and the tax changes, that brought America’s tax rate down to where it was competitive. America always has… [a] big market, biggest economy in the world, growing, et cetera,” he continued. “America has good business conditions in terms of talent, people, worker flexibility, all those types of things.

    “So you put all that together, it was a great place to invest. You go in and say now, I’m going to move the regulation back, and now I’m going to create even better conditions for investment.”

    TRUMP’S DEREGULATION ‘CONSTRUCTIVE FOR GROWTH’: GOLDMAN SACHS C.E.O.

    Bank of America kicked off Q4 earnings season with surging profits, reporting a double beat of $6.67 billion, as its investment banking fees saw a 44% increase to $1.7 billion.

    Bank of America Chairman and CEO Brian Moynihan, inset, is optimistic about the economic environment under a second Trump administration. (FOXBusiness)

    Much of the banking industry is expecting more M&A deals coming to market under President Donald Trump, while he also plans to pull back regulations that stymied transactional activity during the Biden administration.

    Former Biden appointees from the Federal Trade Commission, Federal Communications Commission and the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division halted almost all M&A activity since his term began in 2021. Those who chose to defy the regulatory restrictions faced prolonged legal battles with the Biden deal police.

    NYSE President Lynn Martin joins ‘Mornings with Maria’ to discuss market trends and her outlook for 2025 as the Trump administration takes office. 

    “We were sitting here last year, the issue of business inflation and interest rates, but another big issue was the amount of regulation in small and medium-sized companies, and in the banking system, and the mortgage companies. And the feeling is that it will now swing back to more normalcy,” Moynihan noted.

    “It swung way too far in the last administration,” he added. “We tried to explain to them that was going to cause them troubles… But I think it’s more important that the general economy feels a little bit of relief on regulation across the board, the ability to get deals done, and American companies can now go out domestically and around the world and be the kings that they’re supposed to be.”

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    President Donald Trump makes a major infrastructure announcement on his second day in office.

    Moynihan explained that Bank of America’s top research team is expecting 2.4% GDP growth for the U.S. in 2025, the M&A pipeline being “full” and a 20% increase in IPOs.

    “Therefore, that says the capital can be put to work. So all that bodes well,” the chairman and CEO said. “The enthusiasm by our team for what’s ahead is far greater than it was in the fourth quarter because that was sort of under the old regime.”

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    FOX Business’ Eleanor Terrett contributed to this report.