‘Recession Highly, Highly Likely Still’: CNN’s Richard Quest Pours Cold Water All Over Stock Market Rally

CNN international business host Richard Quest predicted that a recession is still “highly likely” despite the stock market rallying over 7% on President Donald Trump’s 90-day pause on higher tariffs for 75 countries.

Trump announced the pause in a social media post on Wednesday, while also slapping an additional levy on China. Quest noted that “Tariff numbers on Japan 24%, South Korea 15%, the EU 20%, Mexico and Canada. Those are now reduced.”

“Go back to that statement that you just had and you’ll see that what he has now done is he’s taken off the top level of tariffs. Put China to one side. He’s taken off the top level of tariffs and essentially created a new baseline tariff for everybody of 10%,” Quest said on CNN, adding:

That is the new US tariff, 10%. Now, just about all countries can live with that and they can all live with it without retaliating. So to some extent, that is already a major shift in US trade policy. The new tariff for doing business with the United States is 10%. And now you’ve got 90 days to come back and tell us why you shouldn’t go back to 40 percent, 25 percent, 15 percent. Plenty of time.

And there the devil is going to be in the detail because it’s not going to be, as Peter Navarro says, it’s not going to be about reducing your headline number. It’s going to be about your non-tariff barriers, your restrictions, your procurement, your local content, your ownership rules. Now, let’s deal with China. It is really simple. Head to head, toe to toe.

You did 25, we’ve done 25. You did 50, we have done 50. I’m at 125, let’s see what China does tonight. This is just essentially until one side or the other blinks, you can write off bilateral trade between China and the US for the foreseeable future because at these tariff levels, no one’s buying.

Anchor Boris Sanchez then asked, “So Richard, given the prognostications we’ve seen over the last few days about a recession within the year, do you think that this changes that equation?”

“No. No, because China’s a massive part of imports. The level of uncertainty remains very high,” Quest replied, adding:

Just think about it. A week ago, we got this plan. We didn’t get a plan that said, come to me in 90 days and you’ll do it. We got a plan. April the 9th is the deadline. April the 9th came, tariffs came in, and suddenly, tariff’s 90 days away. Who’s to say it’s gonna change tomorrow, or the next day, or three weeks time? No. The underlying policy prescription hasn’t altered. All that’s happened is the capriciousness of the execution has become all the more clear. So a recession, highly, highly likely still.

Watch the clip above via CNN.