Executive Vice Chairman, IBM Common Stock
Gary Cohn says prices are "not going to fall like a rock overnight" if Iran deal is signed
Gary Cohn, IBM vice chairman and the head of the National Economic Council in President Trump's first term, told "Face the ...
About Gary Cohn
Gary Cohn, vice chairman of IBM and former director of the National Economic Council, has made several media appearances discussing the economy, Federal Reserve policy, and artificial intelligence. Commenting on the potential impact of an Iran deal on oil prices, Cohn said prices are "not going to fall like a rock overnight" and that it depends on how quickly the Strait of Hormuz reopens, though he added that a "change in psychology" could eventually lead to lower prices. He noted that rising oil prices "will have an impact on the consumption power of America" and described the economy as K-shaped, with asset owners seeing their holdings appreciate while a "large predominance of our country" faces rising input costs that outpace wage growth. Regarding the Federal Reserve, Cohn said incoming Chair Kevin Warsh understands inflation is at three-year highs and faces political pressure to lower interest rates, but predicted Warsh will "remove himself from the political pressure" and base policy on economic data. Cohn expressed confidence in Warsh's experience from the 2008 financial crisis. On artificial intelligence, Cohn stated he is "in the camp that this time is the same," comparing AI to past technological advancements that were expected to eliminate jobs but instead led to GDP growth
Transcript (13 segments)
✨ AI-enhanced transcript with speaker attribution
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Interviewer0:00
We're joined now by Gary Cohn, who was the top economic advisor to President Trump in his first term. He is currently vice chairman at IBM. Good to have you back here.
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Gary Cohn0:08
Thanks for having me.
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Interviewer0:09
So, Secretary Hegseth didn't give a lot of clarity on the exact time. He said both the Strait of Hormuz would be immediately open, but that it could take up to 30 days. The bottom line for the economy here, it's going to be impacted by what happens with oil and gas prices. Should American consumers expect that the prices they're paying for their food and their gas and everything else is going to fall like a rock?
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Gary Cohn0:35
Well, it's not going to fall like a rock overnight. We're going to have to see exactly what happens in the straits. It was not clear how quickly they'll open. But as they do open, we will start getting a change in psychology. People will start thinking that prices are going down and they will continue to go down. When you're in an upward price environment, people tend to fill their tanks up early because they think the price is going to be higher next week and they tend to not let their tanks go down. When you're in an environment when you think the price is going to get cheaper, people tend to drive their cars till they're almost empty because they think the longer I wait, the cheaper gas will be. So, we're going to be in a psychological change when the straits open and as oil starts flowing out, we will start to see some impact. We've actually already seen some impact. Gas prices are 10% off their recent highs. And if we open the straits, I think we'll continue to see these gas prices come down. But as you also point out, it's not just the price of gasoline. It's the price of groceries, the price of energy feeds through the entire economy and it feeds through manufacturing, it feeds through delivery, it feeds through everything we consume as daily consumers.
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Interviewer1:42
And what you're talking about with prices, you're talking about the price at market, but for the price for consumers, if companies have already jacked up the price of food, are they really going to bring it back down?
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Gary Cohn1:52
Well, they will bring it back. The price of energy will back down. So, the energy component will come back down. Whether actual food at the store will come back down, it will take some time. There's always some pressure. And it takes a first mover to show some leadership. We've seen prices go up, and then if someone wants to bring more retail traffic into their store, they tend to cut the price of a necessity good, and you as a consumer say, 'Hey, that necessity good is cheaper at that store.' I then go to that store, and the other store needs to match their price. So, the open market will drive prices down over time.
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Interviewer2:29
Because as Senator Warner was talking about, those fuel inventories, commercial fuel inventories, they're hitting some risky levels in July that could cause a secondary price spike. Goldman Sachs said what, $10 higher per barrel than before the war because there's this new security premium built in here. Given all the forces you're seeing in the economy right now, do you think the Federal Reserve can really do the kind of rate cut that President Trump very publicly says he wants to see?
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Gary Cohn2:57
Margaret, look, we have exhausted a lot of the global supply of oil. All the major economies do carry an excess reserve, and those excess reserves are at relatively low levels. So, I understand what everyone's concerned about. So, getting oil back online now is important. When it comes to the Federal Reserve, look, we have a new Federal Reserve chairperson, Kevin Warsh. I think Kevin is completely acknowledging where we are in the economy. He understands that we've got inflation at 3-year highs. He also understands that the job market is relatively strong. And he also understands there's pressure on him to lower interest rates. I think Kevin will remove himself from the political pressure, and he will do the right thing economically. Kevin is, this is not his first time in the Federal Reserve. He was a Fed governor before. I think Kevin will approach this as a very traditional Fed governor. He will stay heavily involved in his lane in monetary policy. I think he will stay outside of the secondary issues that the Fed has gotten into more recently, and I think he will also be in a position where he will move based on what he is actually seeing in the economy, not what he hopes he sees in the economy.
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Interviewer4:04
He's also made clear he thinks how we judge the economy may need to change. And look at that differently. To that point, what we saw this past week with SpaceX was pretty incredible. Elon Musk is the first trillionaire with a T. SpaceX, they make rocket ships, they want to put AI data centers in space, they want to mine asteroids. I mean, it sounds like it's straight out of the movies, but this was a huge publicly traded debut this week, the largest ever. We're going to see more AI companies also go public. Where are we in the boom?
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Gary Cohn4:38
So, Margaret, this is a time to celebrate. We should celebrate America's entrepreneurial spirit. We should celebrate America's engineering capabilities. We should celebrate the fact that we are solving some of the biggest problems in the world. And if we in America were not solving these problems, and the Chinese were, we would be way behind them, or paying them to solve our problems if they were willing to sell us the solution. So, I look at this as a massive celebration in American entrepreneurial spirit. As you said, it isn't stopping with SpaceX. And SpaceX is now about a 25-year-old company, one where Elon Musk himself said there's a 10% chance this company even survives. We now have a handful of companies almost of that size that are changing the way you and I live our lives and how we're going to change our lives going forward. And these are American-based companies, American entrepreneurs, American technology, and American engineers. We should be lucky that we have these companies here domestically, and we're not having to entice them into the United States.
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Interviewer5:39
Well, what they're facilitating with this transformation, there's this whole debate about whether it's good or bad for American workers. The Wall Street Journal editorial board, conservatively leaning as you know, was extolling the benefit of SpaceX creating jobs for working-class communities. And said they gave stock options to their workers, so they made blue-collar workers arguably millionaires, right? But by doing something like that. Is that a special case, clearly? But what is the impact on blue-collar workers?
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Gary Cohn6:09
So, you're talking about AI generally. So, look, there's a large debate going on in the economy today and in business today. And the debate is: is this time different or is this time the same? I'm in the camp that this time is the same. And what I mean by that is if you look back at all of the major technological advancements that we have lived through, we read stories about how this was the end of employment. If you go back to the cotton gin or the internal combustion engine or the telephone or the cell phone or the internet, all of these technological inventions were supposed to be the demise of human capital. I think what we have found in history is they're not the demise of human capital. What happens is the gross domestic product, the GDP of the country grows. As it grows, we create more and more jobs. And I think that's what's going on here. There's another phenomenon that's equally as important here. The largest companies in America historically have been asset-light companies and they've been intellectual property heavy. The largest companies in America today are becoming a combination of asset-based companies and intellectual companies. The assets need to be built by people.
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Interviewer7:17
Gary Cohn, good to have your insights as always.