Photo Illustration by Mark Harris; Photos: Bloomberg (3)
Debt Risks That Lured Bessent to US Treasury Now Loom Large
Trump’s choice to run US government finance was part of the Soros team that crashed the pound. His new reality is more complex than any exchange-rate wager.
Scott Bessent built a career on understanding when a government’s economic-policy narrative was fundamentally out of whack with reality.
If he’s confirmed as President-elect Donald Trump’s Treasury secretary next year, his new job will be to ensure the US government doesn’t face on his watch the kind of make-or-break moment that he saw other nations experience during his decades-long career in finance. The challenge is real: Bessent will be inheriting a trajectory for federal borrowing that’s far worse than any of his modern-day predecessors.