Apollo Global Management's Marc Rowan Talks Tariffs and Trade | Bloomberg Talks

Look, what the administration wants to do, in my opinion, is not wrong. We are the freest trading country in the world and have been since the end of World War II. It is not clear to me that we have to be or that we should allow allies and strategic competitors to inhibit our access to their markets. We can take issue with how it's being done and the uncertainty it's creating. But the president and the administration start with a really strong hand. Low unemployment, good job growth, massive capital investment over the last four years and continuing in the US. So now is actually a good time. But we have uncertainty and in the face of uncertainty, people do not make new investments, they do not hire, they do not make moves. We likely will cause two quarters of negative growth if we in fact don't resolve the uncertainty. So until we have resolution of what the rules of the game are, it's going to be slow.

Look, now we're talking about forecasts and projections. In our firm, when we were raising rates 300 and 400 basis points, we talked about a non-recession recession, which is a correction in asset prices, but not necessarily in labor. We kind of see the same thing happening again. It's not to say we won't have some fallout and some adjustment, but we're starting from a place of 4% unemployment, good job growth. We are building infrastructure. We're building semiconductor plants. We're absorbing massive amounts of foreign direct investment. Like it or not, we're building Inflation Reduction Act factories. And now the president is channeling capital from around the world to come back here. Some days I wake up and worry about capital. Most days I wake up and worry about where will we get all the people to do this.

Look, this is now the toughest job in the world is now Scott Bessent's. As I said, we want this administration to succeed. Every American should want this administration to succeed. So, how I would do it is not really relevant. I will point out the following. US and Mexico together should be the driving economic force in the world for the next 50 years. We have not been able to get there despite two or three rounds of massive free trade agreements. The issues that separate us from Mexico are not existential to Mexico. As one leading Mexican industrialist said to me, if it takes tariffs to make Mexico great again, so be it. Inside of Mexico, there's a need for change. Imagine coming to the world with Mexico and Canada resolved first and then taking people piece by piece or country by country. We would just be in a much stronger position to do what we need to do to reset the terms of trade.

Look, we're going to have uncertainty. We have uncertainty already. Until we see critical mass of trading partners agree to ongoing new economic relationships, we're going to have uncertainty.