Billionaire investor Bill Ackman warns of ‘economic nuclear winter’ from Trump tariffs
Hedge fund manager Bill Ackman has issued a stark warning to the US President, urging him to pause the sweeping package of tariffs revealed last week on his so-called ‘Liberation Day’.
In a post on X, Ackman declared: “The President has an opportunity on Monday to call a time out and have the time to execute on fixing an unfair tariff system.
“Alternatively, we are heading for a self-induced, economic nuclear winter, and we should start hunkering down.”
Despite pressing that he was sympathetic towards the aims of Trump’s tariffs, saying that the US “is 100 per cent behind the president on fixing a global system of tariffs that has disadvantaged the country”, but “business is a confidence game and confidence depends on trust.”
He cautioned that the “massive and disproportionate” tariffs have gone too far, and that the US is “in the process of destroying confidence in our country as a trading partner, as a place to do business, and as a market to invest capital.”
Ackman added: “What CEO and what board of directors will be comfortable making large, long-term, economic commitments in our country in the middle of an economic nuclear war?
“I don’t know of one who will do so.”
Global markets carnage continues
Global markets are bracing for another bruising week, with the FTSE 100 set to fall even further on Monday.
On Friday, the FTSE 100 closed on a staggering 4.9 per cent loss at 8,063.12 – the worst tumble for the London index since the start of the Covid lockdown in March 2020.
The S&P 500 fell nearly five per cent whilst the Dow Jones plunged four per cent.
Ackman endorsed Trump in his third bid for the White House in 2024, but now says that the scale of the tariffs was “not what we voted for.”
He announced his support for Trump’s bid for the White House following the assassination attempt on the now-US President.
“The consequences for our country and the millions of our citizens who have supported the president — in particular low-income consumers who are already under a huge amount of economic stress — are going to be severely negative,” he added.
Signing off on his extended social media warning to Trump, Ackman said: “May cooler heads prevail.”