Jamie Dimon hits out at Donald Trump’s proposed steel tariff and trade war threat

The boss of JP Morgan Chase has blasted President Donald Trump’s plan to impose a steep tariff on steel and aluminium imports.

“We don’t believe in these tariffs,” said Jamie Dimon, adding that the move would open up a “Pandora’s Box” of problems.

“There are serious issues around trade. WTO [World Trade Organisation] needs to get its act together and get a little more ambitious about fixing some of these problems, but I think tariffs is the wrong way to go about it,” Dimon said, speaking on Bloomberg TV.

Trump last week announced a plan to introduce a 25 per cent tariff on steel imports and a 10 per cent tariff on aluminium.

“There may be more, there may be retaliations, it kind of opens up a whole Pandora’s Box of additional problems…. It could escalate and it could hurt growth”.

Fears of a looming trade war were ramped up following the departure of Trump’s most senior economic adviser and free trade advocate Gary Cohn Tuesday night.

Cohn’s resignation, which reportedly occurred after a clash with Trump on the tariff proposal, was “terrible”, Dimon said.

The JP Morgan boss said Cohn was a strong proponent of economic growth who understood how an economy runs and was good to have in the White House.

Read more: Free trade advocate Gary Cohn has exited the White House