The Market Will Survive Trump, Says Economist Who's Seen It All

There may be tough times ahead for the US and the US dollar while Asia may also have to brace itself for an AI shock, says IMF and MAS veteran.

- Ravi Velloor

An economist who has had a ringside view of many major upheavals globally over the past four decades is not overly worried about US President Donald Trump's assault on trade. He feels the system will adjust to the shock and that Mr Trump may have to walk back some of his moves, though the United States itself may eventually face a recession. He also sees dependence on the US dollar declining.

Dr Khor Hoe Ee has been a career economist with the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), and in recent years, Amro—the Asean Plus Three Macroeconomic Research Office that he helped to set up. He has seen up close the Latin American debt crisis, the Asian financial flu of the late 1990s, the 2008 global financial crisis and more recent challenges such as the Covid-19 pandemic and the tariff war unleashed by the US.

Heading into a well-earned retirement this week as he stepped down as Amro chief economist, the Penang-born Dr Khor sat down with me for a two-hour conversation on both present-day challenges and past ones he's witnessed since he began his career, shortly before earning his PhD in economics from Princeton University in 1982.

His hands-on experience in addressing some of these crises has shaped his panic-free approach to problems.

So, when I asked him about the leading issue grabbing headlines these days in East Asia—the tariffs imposed by President Trump—he appeared relatively sanguine, referring to Mr Trump as a "bit of an aberration".

"The tariffs are disruptive but it is not systemic in a sense," says Dr Khor, who for the past decade has led the macroeconomic surveillance of the region. "The market is bigger than Trump."