Shane Solly: Harbour Asset Management spokesperson ahead of Donald Trump's 'Liberation Day' of tariffs

President Donald Trump is set to unveil a barrage of tariffs on April 2nd - and industry experts have voiced concerns.

The day has been dubbed 'Liberation Day' by the President and his aides, and business experts and economists are worried it will cost jobs and create economic turmoil. 

Harbour Asset Management's Shane Solly explains what could come out of this - and what risks it holds for New Zealand.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Shane Soli's with US harbor Esset Management, Shane good Evening.
Get it right, Hey, Donald Trump, We've got Liberation Day
coming April second, so we're just a few days away. Now,
what do we know? What can we say that we
know about the tariffs that are potentially coming our way?

Speaker 2 (00:15):
Well, it's a really good point. So euphemistically Liberation Day,
some pretty chunky increases in Twiss Canada, Mexico and China
and potentially what they call in the DWTY fifteen a
bunch of companies there for more than fifteen percent of
persistent trade surpluses with the US. Look for New Zealand,
it's a risk, right, We're not directly in the targets
of the US twas, but we are exposed to this

(00:38):
trade disruption, including this reciprocal trade tarifts, and so we
think we're already potentially seeing that slowing pace of recovery
in New Zealand economy reflects some of this weariness around tarrace.
Business is holding back and the risk for US is
that we get caught up in the middle of a
global trade war. Look, we're going to find out on
Wednesday night in Newson Time. We know that there's lots

(00:59):
of room for movement between now and then. Ryan, this
is a trade negotiation done by mister Trump. There's lots
of things that could move. So that's hard to be definitive,
but we are facing a bit of a headpoint.

Speaker 1 (01:10):
Yeah, what is the head we're going to do to
growth forecasts?

Speaker 2 (01:14):
Yeah, I think particularly the US, we've already seen a
number of forecasters dial back their growth reflecting this tariffs
and also the government spending push by the Trump government.
So we have seen growth forecasts drop from around five
percentage where they currently are to out the next few
years right down sort of med fours, and so we

(01:35):
are seeing that being a risk for US economic activity.
There's a little bit of an offset globally. Certainly we're
seeing Europe and China announcing spending increases by their governments,
and we've seen a bit of a lifting activity there.
But certainly there's a risk to global growth from this
US economy coming off what's been a pretty strong run.

Speaker 1 (01:53):
We've had the A and Z Business Outlooks Survey for
the month of March out today. What are we hearing
from that?

Speaker 2 (02:00):
Yeah, look, you know, again with slightly more business confidence
is okay, in new Zeale. We have seen it hold
up at positive levels, suggesting there's a bit of a
gradual recovery. We're seeing new ze on it's likely to continue.
Not all positive. There's an investment in employment intentions a
bit of a slip and some pricing intentions going up,
so that's something the Reserve Bank will be watching for.

(02:23):
But this sort of lead indicator, we're seeing enough positivity
coming through and own activity that's the real gauge of
how do you think give about your own business? Your
own activity that actually increased four points to plus forty nine,
so not quite fifty fifty is where we want to
see growth, but we're getting back to it.

Speaker 1 (02:40):
This is obviously the last day of the March quarter.
How are capital markets responding. We've got increased uncertainly globally
which you've touched on, and got the potential trade terrorifts,
but we've also got the geopolitical situation. How are capital
markets responding.

Speaker 2 (02:53):
Yeah, it's been a pretty pretty rugged quarter. We certainly
seen to invest a risk tolerance for these a lot
of growth for quests to come through, so some of
the high risk, high growth as it's like, for example,
shares making the generally forms what the defensive assets have done,
but better it probably the interesting ones of things like
the US dollar is this thing called the d x

(03:14):
ys US Dollar Index. It's fallen from one hundred and
eight at the end of December to one hundred and
four and hour, so about four percent. You're kind of
a big deal. That's where people park their money when
they want to be saved. But what has really performed
Ryan's goal up almost seventeen or actually eighteen percent to
just add a three thy one hundred US prouns. That
just shows how anxious investors are our worried there about

(03:37):
this global setting. They've gone back to the og defensive asset.
So quite a big spring. We've gone from markets pricing
and perfection at the end of December to markets pricing
and a degree of chaos at the end of March.

Speaker 1 (03:52):
Interesting, Shane, Thank you very much for that. Shane, Sally
Harbor Asset Management with us on your Monday Evening.

Speaker 2 (03:57):
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