Australian share market braces for $115 billion meltdown
The Australian share market is bracing for a $100 billion-plus wipeout on Monday morning as the fallout from Donald Trump’s tariffs continues to roil global markets.
Trump jolted the world when he announced broad tariffs on Wednesday (local time), triggering retaliatory levies from China and sparking fears of a recession.
US stocks tumbled by around 10 per cent in the two days after Trump announced a new global tariff regime that was more aggressive than analysts and investors had been anticipating.
Most economists and the head of the US Federal Reserve believe the tariffs risk stoking inflation and damaging economic growth.
Australia’s ASX200 took a huge hit on Friday and the bloodbath is expected to continue when markets open on Monday morning.
The ASX futures are pointing to a drop of 4.29 per cent, which would be losses of up to $115 billion.
Front of mind for investors is the concern that the US and global markets could be headed towards recession.
America’s largest bank, JPMorgan, warned that if Trump’s tariffs were implemented in full, it would be a “substantial macroeconomic shock” that “could push the US and global economy into recession this year”.
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Trump’s top officials took to the airwaves over the weekend to defend the sweeping new tariffs and claimed that more than 50 countries had reached out to the White House to begin trade talks.
On Sunday morning talk shows, top Trump advisers sought to portray the tariffs as a savvy repositioning of the US in the global trade order and the economic disruptions as a short-term fallout.
In a Truth Social post on Friday, Trump shared a video that suggested his tariffs aimed to hammer the stock market on purpose in a bid to force lower interest rates.
But during an interview on ABC News’ This Week, US National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett denied that the tariffs were part of a strategy by Trump to crash financial markets to pressure the US Federal Reserve to cut interest rates.
He said there would be no “political coercion” of the central bank.
In a separate interview on NBC News’s Meet the Press, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent downplayed the stock market drop and said there was “no reason” to anticipate a recession based on the tariffs.
‘Hands Off’ protests were held across the US at the weekend. Photo: AAP
Meanwhile, the world’s richest man, Elon Musk, appeared to split from the Trump administration over the tariffs when he commented on his hope for a “zero tariff situation” with Europe.
“At the end of the day, I hope it’s agreed that both Europe and the United States should move ideally, in my view, to a zero tariff situation, effectively creating a free trade zone between Europe and North America,” Musk said at a gathering of Italy’s right-wing League Party.
Musk also became involved in a public spat with Trump’s trade adviser Peter Navarro, who was one of several top officials taking to the airwaves to defend the tariffs.
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The Tesla chief commented on a video on X of Navarro defending the Trump administration’s calculations on tariffs.
Musk noted that Navarro’s degree from Harvard University didn’t necessarily qualify him.
“PhD in Econ from Harvard is a bad thing, not a good thing,” wrote Musk on X.
He responded to another comment which was defending Navarro and stated: “He ain’t built shit”.
Navarro hit back in a TV interview on Fox and suggested Musk was merely “protecting his own interests as any business person would do.”
“Elon, when he’s in his DOGE [Department of Government Efficiency] lane is great, but we understand what’s going on here. Elon sells cars. He’s simply protecting his own interests,” said Navarro.
“And he’s in Texas assembling cars that have big parts of that car from Mexico, China — the batteries come from Japan or China; the electronics come from Taiwan.
“There’s no rift here. Look, Elon, he’s got X, he’s got a big microphone. We don’t mind him saying whatever he wants.”
Tariff-stunned markets face another week of potential tariff turmoil, with fallout from Trump’s sweeping import levies keeping investors on edge after the worst week for US stocks since the onset of the COVID-19 crisis five years ago.
Hassett told ABC News’ This Week that Trump’s tariffs had so far driven “more than 50” countries to contact the White House to begin trade talks.
Taiwan’s President Lai Ching-te on Sunday offered zero tariffs as the basis for talks with the US, pledging to remove trade barriers rather than imposing reciprocal measures and saying Taiwanese companies will raise their US investments.
Unlike other economists, Hassett said he did not expect a big hit to consumers because exporters were likely to lower prices.
Bessent told NBC News he did not anticipate a recession based on the tariffs, citing stronger-than-anticipated US jobs growth.
“We could see from the jobs number on Friday, that was well above expectations, that we are moving forward, so I see no reason that we have to price in a recession,” Bessent said.
