Business
Financial CEOs are weighing in on the state of the economy
Some of America’s top financial services executives are starting to issue warnings about the economy.
Saying they’re seeing signs of “softening” or “weakening,” a slew of CEOs have been weighing in ahead of next week’s Federal Reserve decision and with the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics revising job numbers lower this week.
In a Wednesday CNBC interview, Goldman Sachs CEO David Solomon said while the economy is “still chugging along,” the signals may be pointing in a different direction.
“There are number of CEOs that are talking about a softening in the economy – there’s no question,” he said. “We’ve seen some job data that indicates that there has been some softening.”
The BLS, in a preliminary report released Tuesday, revised its nonfarm payrolls data for the year prior to March 2025, showing a significant drop of 911,000 from the initial estimates. The revisions were more than 50% higher than last year’s and the biggest shift in more than 20 years, adding to growing concern over the economy.
The BLS has also come under fire from President Donald Trump, who fired the head of the bureau in early August and has criticized its data collection methods.
Solomon said he believes there’s “still more work to do” with today’s inflation and that tariffs are having an impact on growth, but that it’s difficult to quantify at this stage. As the economy heads into fall, Solomon said he expects a slight change in the policy rate, including a 25-basis point cut by the Fed next week.
Trump has also been critical of the central bank, calling for lower interest rates and bashing Fed Chair Jerome Powell. The Federal Open Market Committee last cut its benchmark interest rate in December 2024 and has held it steady since then in a target range of 4.25% to 4.5%.
JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon told CNBC on Tuesday that he believes the Fed will “probably” lower interest rates at its meeting next week, but that it may “not be consequential to the economy.
Dimon said he also believes the BLS report confirms that the U.S. economy is slowing down.
“I think the economy is weakening,” Dimon told CNBC’s Leslie Picker in an interview. “Whether it’s on the way to recession or just weakening, I don’t know.”
But ultimately, Dimon said the country will simply have to “wait and see” how the economy will progress given the weakening consumer.
Similarly, Wells Fargo CEO Charles Scharf told CNBC Wednesday that his bank is seeing lower-income Americans struggling to stay afloat, despite larger companies seemingly doing well.
“There is this big dichotomy between higher-income and lower-income consumers which continues and is a real issue,” Scharf said.
Commenting on the BLS numbers, Scharf said it’s “undeniable” that the discrepancy between American taxpayers exists and that he sees “more downside” to the U.S. economy.
Job creation in August also showed signs of weakness, as the BLS reported last week that nonfarm payrolls increased by just 22,000 for the month.
Morgan Stanley CEO Ted Pick told CNBC that he believes the American CEO or CFO has had to become resilient throughout the country’s recent ups and downs, including Covid and two Trump administrations.
“We’re in a place where I think some of the policy uncertainty is actually starting to get quantified,” he said.
Still, Pick said he’s seen the headwinds coming through and believes the policy uncertainty may be narrowing slightly.
“So, yes, there may be a little bit of a slowdown,” Pick said, adding that he’ll wait to see how it all plays out.
Barclays CEO C. S. Venkatakrishnan said on CNBC on Tuesday that he believes the Fed will cut on the margin, partly due to the softness in the labor market.
Traders are also expecting to see the Fed lower rates. They currently see a near certainty that the Fed will cut by at least a quarter point, according to the CME Fedwatch tool based on Fed futures trading, and some are betting that there will be an even deeper cut of 50 basis points, or a half percentage point.
Even if inflation problems haven’t tangibly presented themselves yet, Venkatakrishnan said the current economy is signaling that CEOs should have their eyes on the longer term.
“We haven’t seen them yet, but we’ve got to be worried about them,” he said.
PNC Financial Services CEO Bill Demchak also joined the wave, telling CNBC on Tuesday there’s “underlying pressures in our economy” between hiring workers, labor shortages, wage pressure and more.
Demchak said he’s seeing evidence to support the BLS’ revised report, and he believes that evidence is likely the reason that the Fed will cut rates going forward, even as consumer spending is “driving the economy.”
“There’s pressures inside of our economy that I don’t know disappear just because tariffs might get behind us at some point,” Demchak said.
US President Donald Trump has said he will sue the New York Times for $15bn (£11bn) over what he called defamation and libel.
“The New York Times has been allowed to freely lie, smear, and defame me for far too long, and that stops, NOW!” Trump posted on his social media platform, Truth Social, on Monday.
He singled out the Times’ endorsement of Kamala Harris in the last presidential election in 2024, saying it had become a “mouthpiece for the Radical Left Democrat Party”.
A spokesperson for the newspaper said the suit was “an attempt to stifle and discourage independent reporting”, adding it “has no merit”.
“The New York Times will not be deterred by intimidation tactics,” the spokesperson added.
Trump said that his lawsuit was being launched in Florida, a Republican stronghold.
He has long expressed displeasure at what he bills left-leaning media outlets unfavourable to his presidency.
In a post late on Monday, Trump took issue at the Times’ endorsement of his election rival, saying: “Their Endorsement of Kamala Harris was actually put dead center on the front page of The New York Times, something heretofore UNHEARD OF!”
In the post he also accused other media outlets or TV programmes of “smearing” him through “a highly sophisticated system of document and visual alteration”.
ABC News and Paramount’s CBS News both agreed to multimillion-dollar payouts to Trump to settle lawsuits brought by the president in recent months.
He has also launched a case against the Wall Street Journal over its reporting on the Epstein scandal.
This is not the first time Trump has sought to sue the New York Times.
In 2023, a judge has dismissed a lawsuit filed by him, then an ex-president, against the New York Times, saying the claims in the lawsuit “fail as a matter of constitutional law”.
The $100m (£79m) lawsuit accused the newspaper and Trump’s estranged niece, Mary Trump, of “an insidious plot” to obtain his tax records.
It was filed in 2021 and relates to a Pulitzer Prize-winning series on Trump’s financial affairs.
Trump also lost another defamation bid in 2023, when he sought in vain to sue CNN for allegedly likening him to Adolf Hitler. A federal judge later threw out the $475m (£369m) lawsuit.
Clarification: This story has been updated to include the lawsuits against ABC News and Paramount which ended with settlements in Trump’s favour.
Business
US Fed meeting begins: Trump aide Stephen Miran sworn in as governor, Jerome Powell under pressure as rate cut expected – The Times of India
The US Federal Reserve opened a key interest rate meeting on Tuesday, just hours after Donald Trump’s close aide Stephen Miran was sworn in as a governor of the central bank, while another top official, Lisa Cook, is fighting the president’s attempt to oust her.Miran, who has been a senior adviser to Trump, took the oath of office on Tuesday, the Fed said in a statement, as its rate-setting Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) began a two-day policy gathering AFP reported. His arrival followed a narrow Senate vote on Monday night confirming him as one of the FOMC’s 12 voting members.Markets widely expect the Fed to announce its first interest rate cut of 2025 when the meeting concludes on Wednesday, as policymakers seek to shore up a weakening jobs market. But political pressure on the independent central bank has intensified, with Trump repeatedly urging Chair Jerome Powell to cut rates more aggressively.Miran’s appointment gives him a single vote on the FOMC, and it is unclear whether he will align with Trump’s calls for steeper reductions. On Tuesday, Trump told reporters that the Fed should “listen to smart people like me.”Before joining the Fed, Miran was serving as chairman of the White House Council of Economic Advisers. His decision to take a leave of absence from that role, rather than resign, drew criticism from Democratic lawmakers, particularly as his Fed term lasts just over four months. He is filling the unexpired term of Adriana Kugler, who stepped down before her stint was due to end in late January.The meeting is also overshadowed by Trump’s attempt to remove Cook, a Fed governor appointed by former president Joe Biden, over allegations of mortgage fraud. Cook has not been charged, and the alleged incidents predate her appointment. A federal appeals court ruled late Monday that she could remain in place while her legal challenge proceeds, but the Trump administration plans to take the case to the Supreme Court.White House spokesman Kush Desai told AFP that the president “lawfully removed Lisa Cook for cause,” which he said could mean malfeasance or dereliction of duty. He added: “The administration will appeal this decision and looks forward to ultimate victory on the issue.”The Fed has held its benchmark lending rate between 4.25 percent and 4.50 percent since December, monitoring the impact of Trump’s tariffs on the economy. Markets are betting on a 25-basis point cut this week, while looking for signals on the pace and scale of reductions in the months ahead.
New Delhi: A team of officials from the Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR), led by Chief Negotiator for India–US Bilateral Trade Agreement talks Brendan Lynch, visited India on Monday to advance discussions on a proposed trade pact.
According to a statement from the Ministry of Commerce & Industry, the delegation held talks with senior officials from the Department of Commerce, led by the Special Secretary, focusing on key aspects of India–US trade ties, including the much-anticipated Bilateral Trade Agreement.
The ministry said both sides acknowledged the enduring importance of bilateral trade between the two countries. “The discussions were positive and forward-looking, covering various aspects of the trade deal,” the statement added.
It was also decided to intensify efforts to achieve the early conclusion of a mutually beneficial trade agreement, signalling a renewed push by both governments to resolve pending issues and expand economic cooperation.
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