By AnnaMaria Andriotis, Gina Heeb and Alexander Saeedy
Last week, bank CEOs including JPMorgan Chase’s Jamie Dimon, Goldman Sachs’s David Solomon, Bank of America’s Brian Moynihan and Wells Fargo’s Charlie Scharf were in Washington for an industry meeting when the matter of communications with the White House came up.
Executives in the room took turns saying when they last spoke to President Trump. The general response: not recently. Many of them said they hadn’t had a substantive discussion with Trump since the pandemic hammered markets in 2020, according to people familiar with the meeting.
The nation’s most powerful bankers have a unique lens into markets and the economy, often making them valued advisers and sounding boards for top government officials.
While some bankers have been talking to administration officials during the tariff-driven turbulence of the past week, including Vice President JD Vance and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, top executives sense their opinions don’t carry much weight with the president.
Big banks’ lack of direct influence during the latest market turmoil is in contrast to past crises such as the pandemic or the 2008 financial meltdown, when Washington worked hand-in-hand with them to calm the waters. When the Covid-19 pandemic began, Trump called the bank CEOs to a televised meeting where they went around the table talking about the measures they were taking to settle the economy.
This time, bankers are uncertain about Trump’s endgame on tariffs, and uneasy about the impact on the global economy as well as their own businesses. A Wall Street that had been excited for Trump, and the unleashing of animal spirits in markets, is now deflated.
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