January 28, 2026
WHEN: Today, Wednesday, January 28, 2026
WHERE: CNBC’s “Squawk on the Street”
Following is the unofficial transcript of a CNBC interview with U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on CNBC’s “Squawk on the Street” (M-F, 9AM-11AM ET) today, Wednesday, January 28. Following are links to video on CNBC.com: https://www.cnbc.com/video/2026/01/28/treasury-secretary-scott-bessent-absolutely-not-intervening-in-the-currency-market.html and https://www.cnbc.com/video/2026/01/28/watch-cnbcs-full-interview-with-treasury-secretary-scott-bessent.html.
All references must be sourced to CNBC.
SARA EISEN: Thank you. Well the Treasury Department is hosting this full day summit here in Washington highlighting the launch of Trump Accounts. This is a federally supported investment initiative for children in the U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent joins me now to discuss. Thank you for having us here today.
SCOTT BESSENT: Good to see you, Sara.
EISEN: It's great to be here. What, what sort of announcements can we expect because I know there are a lot of business leaders and, and a lot have already jumped on the bandwagon with these Trump Accounts.
BESSENT: Well, we've got business leaders, we have philanthropists, we've got companies that are going to talk about contributing to the Trump Accounts and today we want to raise the profile. We want all Americans to start signing up. So, just this week since the start of filing season with the IRS we have had 600,000 families out of an estimated 25 million already fill out form 4547.
EISEN: So, it's so people are signing up because that was one of the things, you know, maybe, we maybe you could try to get it to be more automatically tied to Social Security numbers so people don't have to opt in. Maybe that's a better way of bringing especially low-income Americans.
BESSENT: Well, look we think that everyone will do it. You can do it on your phone and so everyone could go to trumpaccount.gov sign up today.
EISEN: I think part of what you're trying to do as you've said it is mint a new generation of, of capitalists. I like to think also minting a new generation of CNBC viewers.
BESSENT: Yeah.
EISEN: But, you know, we do have this thing in the country where 39 percent according to a recent Gallup poll of people have a favorable view of socialism and a little more than 50 percent have a favorable view of capitalism. What's going on there?
BESSENT: Well, to, I think that dovetails somewhat that 38 percent of American households have no exposure to equities. So, I think with these Trump Accounts the president's done peace deals, trade deals, and tax deals but imagine like this enduring legacy as the children who are born in '25 '26 '27 '28, in 18 years when these accounts have been compounding for that period the money goes into a broad-based index fund. And I've done a lot of financial literacy and this is a real time learning experiment. So, everyone is going to, we're going to shoot to get everyone at stake in the great innovation in our country in the economic engine and I bet if we do this survey in five, ten years we'll have drastically different results.
EISEN: Well, it helps that the S&P is making new highs every day. We're coming off of three straight years of double-digit consecutive gains in the S&P. We're at 7,000. I mean how sustainable is that?
BESSENT: Again markets fluctuate but I think we put in the good policies for sound economic growth and we are seeing record S&P earnings. We are seeing the trillions of dollars of investment come back to the U.S. and we're seeing inflation move back towards the Fed's target. So, and, that as someone who's studied this and made a career of it that the previous the performance doesn't dictate what we're going to see this year it's events and its policy and I think we got great policies.
EISEN: I mean speaking of investing in in America I mean one question people have right now is the appeal of U.S. assets especially when they look at the U.S. dollar which is trading at multi-year lows. I know the president sort of endorsed this as a good thing yesterday but is it really a good thing if people are wondering if the dollar is the right place to be?
BESSENT: Well, again U.S. always has a strong dollar policy but a strong dollar policy means setting the right fundamentals and I think that with President Trump with the one big beautiful bill with our regulatory policies we are making this the best place to come, build your business, have tax certainty regulatory certainty energy certainty and over time that the, the prices on the screen can fluctuate over six months a year.
EISEN: You don't worry about dramatic weakness in the dollar?
BESSENT: Again if we have sound policies the money will flow in and we are bringing down our trade deficits so the, automatically that should lead to more dollar strength over time.
EISEN: Are we intervening in the currency market right now strengthening the yen. Is that happening?
BESSENT: Absolutely not.
EISEN: Is that something you're planning to do? There was word that the New York Fed was -- was looking for prices.
BESSENT: Again we don't comment other than to say we have a strong dollar policy and again I think President Trump has the past year 2025 was about setting the table and now I think we're going to have a very strong economy this year. The Democrats don't shut down the government. The Atlanta Fed GDP now numbers 5.4 percent. When was the last time we saw that?
EISEN: It's a high growth number and one of the questions is can we get that kind of growth without sparking inflation?
BESSENT: I think we can because what causes inflation is supply constraint and with the deregulatory agenda that we have we are creating supply whether it's in financial lending, whether it's in energy, we're increasing manufacturing. So, again, what led to the great inflation was the Democrats caused a demand shock with government spending but they caused a supply constraint with all the overregulation. We're doing the opposite. We got a private sector boom and we are taking out dozens of regulations for every new regulation that goes in.
EISEN: But there will be stimulus this year as a result of the what the Big Beautiful Bill, the tax refunds that are set to hit the economy. I guess the question is, can we avoid inflation in that -- in that scenario? We're already starting to see it in wages.
BESSENT: Sorry?
EISEN: We're already starting to see the wages climb.
BESSENT: We're also seeing substantial productivity. So, productivity and wage growth does not lead to inflation and there's measured inflation and observable inflation. Measured inflation is with a lag, so we can see that rents are substantially down. It's different than the measurement. So, the observable inflation some of the more online or quick sampling inflation numbers are substantially below two percent already.
EISEN: Today it's Fed Day. We're expecting the Fed to do nothing today on rates. Is that a mistake?
BESSENT: Again that's up to, to the Fed and we'll see what, what they do. I do think that there are many members on the board who had a false narrative on inflation and I hope that they will have an open mind and see what's coming over the next couple of months.
EISEN: Speaking of what's coming, when do you expect the president to make the decision or the announcement around the next Fed chair because this weekend is when Governor Miran's term is actually up.
BESSENT: Well, it doesn't have to be up, so it can continue. I went out with the president to Iowa for a great rally yesterday and we had a long discussion on the plane back.
EISEN: Did you make your recommendation?
BESSENT: I don't make recommendations. I give the president options and outcomes. It's going to be the president's decision and again the president has great respect for the Fed. We have four great candidates.
EISEN: Four still. Four candidates. We haven't narrowed that down.
BESSENT: Sorry?
EISEN: We haven't narrowed it down beyond four.
BESSENT: We haven't narrowed it down. We haven't expanded it.
EISEN: OK and we don't know exactly when that announcement is coming.
BESSENT: Only the president knows.
EISEN: OK. So, the other, you know, sort of factor on investors' minds right now is the geopolitics. The fact that, you know, this week President Trump is raising tariffs on South Korea because they haven't ratified their -- their trade deal. What -- what signal does that send to some of the other countries that you've negotiated these deals with and have already announced them?
BESSENT: Sign the trade deal. The South Korean Parliament has not passed the trade deal so there is no trade deal until they ratify it.
EISEN: So, that's until they ratify it they will face the 25 percent tariffs?
BESSENT: Well, I think it's helpful to get things moved along.
EISEN: What about Europe and India signing this -- this massive trade deal? Does that -- does that threaten America that some of these, these countries are moving ahead with free trade without us?
BESSENT: Again they should do what's best for themselves but I, I will tell you I found, I find the Europeans very disappointing because the Europeans are on the front line of the Ukraine-Russia war. The Europeans, India started buying sanctioned Russian oil and guess who was buying the refined products? The Europeans. So, the Europeans have been funding the war against themselves and like something that you couldn't have made up. The U.S. sanctioned or put a 25 percent tariff on India for buying the Russian oil. The Europeans were unwilling to join us and it turns out because they wanted to do this trade deal. So, every time you hear a European talk about the importance of the Ukrainian people remember that they put trade ahead of the Ukrainian people. Trade -- European trade, more important than ending the war in Ukraine.
EISEN: They need energy though I guess is part of their issue.
BESSENT: At a price they want cheap energy but we could have cheaper energy too if we were willing to buy sanctioned Russian oil.
EISEN: What about Canada? We've got a bit of a rift there lately and -- and there's different accounts between you and Prime Minister Mark Carney about that call this week post Davos with, with President Trump. He says that he dug in and reinforced the message. You said that he walked it back.
BESSENT: I was on the call. Prime Minister Carney in my investment career I've seen what happens when a technocrat tries to pivot and become a politician never really works out well. So, I would just encourage Prime Minister Carney to do what he thinks is best for the Canadian people not his own virtue signaling because we do have a USMCA negotiation coming up. And he wrote rose to power on an anti-American anti-Trump message. And that's not a great place to be when you're negotiating with an economy that is multiple larger than you are and your big, biggest trading partner. In the end, I think we will end up in a good place, may not be a straight line.
EISEN: Are you saying that they will face consequences in these trade negotiations reopening the USMCA?
BESSENT: I am saying that I would not pick a fight they're going into USMCA to score some cheap political points. Either you are working for your own political career or you're working for the Canadian people.
EISEN: What about our own government now as you referenced we could be barreling toward the shutdown at the end of the week. Last time we did see an economic effect but as a result of the shutdown what do you expect?
BESSENT: We did. I, I don't know what to expect. The Democrats can become unhinged like they were last time and they don't care like they think this is a way to stop President Trump.
EISEN: I think they're tapping into something in the mood of the country when it comes to the funding of ICE.
BESSENT: Again the President Trump has brought down the temperature on the situation. He's in constant contact and he is urging them not to shut down the government. And again, that much of what came -- what happened during the shutdown or some of what happened during the shutdown that gets pushed into this quarter but especially on the service side when the government shut down that never comes back. So, there's -- there's a big permanent loss I hope the Democrats won't do that again.
EISEN: Do you, are you hearing from business leaders on Minnesota and what's going on there. They've been a little reluctant to speak out but we are we are, we are seeing them communicate with their employees about the situation. What do you hear?
BESSENT: I haven't heard from any business leaders on it.
EISEN: Do you see any potential economic fallout around this if we see I don't know certain pockets of, of workers immigrants reluctant to go to work that sort of thing?
BESSENT: Well, I, what I can tell you is that we've seen about two, two and a half million the illegal aliens either through voluntary deportation or ICE deportations leave the workforce. And one of the things that no one believed would happen was we're seeing the low-end housing or low-end rents go down. So, affordability, part of the affordability crisis was letting in 10-20 million new people who all needed a place to live. So, what we are seeing is better affordability.
EISEN: Yeah, on the affordability I, you know, the business leaders that we talked to that I talked to always praise the Trump administration as being pro-growth, pro-business. But this year there's been some surprises, the latest is the health insurers selling off on, on keeping these Medicare rates flat but also, you know, trying to get Wall Street out of the housing market, capping credit card rates, some of these are seen as more populist less pro-business measures.
BESSENT: Well, again the business leaders always want everything all the time. This administration if we, if we take the, the big banks or all banks at Treasury at the three regulators controller of the currency, the Fed, FDIC, we've been very pro safe, sound, and smart deregulation. They've got record profits, the stocks are at a record high. And then, they get upset when we want to examine the credit card business. The, President Trump has said that Obamacare is really just a subsidy for the insurance companies. All we did was saying, we're not raising the amounts that we're paying to these health care providers who have doused the government and not provided great service to the American people.
EISEN: So, you're going to, you're going to stick with these policies. A lot of, a lot of people think that the credit card one can't ultimately pass.
BESSENT: Again Sara, what we've seen is in the old days you used to compete on APR, the annual financing rate. Now, you compete on benefits on rewards, and the benefits and the rewards go mostly to upper-end clients. So, why not pull down the benefits and the rewards a little and have a look at the rates. Because before, before the GFC, the average spread over fed funds for credit cards was about a thousand basis points and now we've just blown that out.
EISEN: OK. Well, look. We'll see what happens and where that one goes. But we certainly appreciate the time here at the Trump Accounts Summit, Secretary Besant. Thank you.
BESSENT: Good. It's exciting day. We're going to have some exciting announcements.
EISEN: OK. Well, we'll be reporting them here. That is the Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent.
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