Scott Bessent dismisses Jamie Dimon's debt concerns, saying none of his past predictions have been right
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said on Sunday that he doesn't agree with Jamie Dimon's prediction that the bond market will crack.
"I've known Jamie a long time and for his entire career he's made predictions like this. Fortunately, none of them have come true. That's why he's a banker, a great banker. He tries to look around the corner," Bessent said in an interview on CBS' "Face the Nation."
Dimon, CEO of JPMorgan, told attendees at the Reagan National Economic Forum on Friday that the US "massively overdid" spending and quantitative easing during the COVID-19 pandemic. Dimon predicted this will lead to a "crack in the bond market."
"It is going to happen," Dimon said on Friday.
"I just don't know if it's going to be a crisis in six months or six years, and I'm hoping that we change both the trajectory of the debt and the ability of market makers to make markets," he added.
Bessent said the government is working on shrinking its deficit, and the administration intends to "leave the country in great shape in 2028."
"So the deficit this year is going to be lower than the deficit last year, and in two years it will be lower again. We are going to bring the deficit down slowly. We didn't get here in one year, and this has been a long process," Bessent told CBS.
Last month, House Republicans passed President Donald Trump's " big beautiful bill." The bill, in its current form, is expected to raise the deficit by $2.5 trillion over the next 10 years, per the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.
The bill is now with the Senate, and GOP lawmakers hope to have it on Trump's desk by July 4.
Dimon isn't the only one who has raised concerns about the US deficit.
Last week, Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk said in an interview with "CBS Sunday Morning" that he was " disappointed to see the massive spending bill." A clip from Musk's interview was released on Tuesday. The full interview aired on Sunday.
"I was, like, disappointed to see the massive spending bill, frankly, which increases the budget deficit, not just decrease it, and undermines the work that the DOGE team is doing," Musk said.
Musk was the leader of the White House DOGE office from January to May. He announced his departure from the Trump administration on Wednesday.
"I think a bill can be big or it could be beautiful. But I don't know if it could be both," Musk told CBS.
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