Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on Monday pushed back on eyebrow-raising criticism from his investment guru, billionaire Stanley Druckenmiller, and defended the Trump administration’s recent interventions in the bond market.
“Stan is a great investor, but what I want to point out is that the U.S. Treasury market has been the best performing market since he took office,” Bessent told CNBC’s Sarah Eisen on the sidelines of the Group of 20 finance ministers meeting in Asheville, North Carolina.
When Eisen pointed out that bond yields are rising around the world, Bessent said, “That’s not the case in the United States. Yields have been flat since the president took office.” Government bond yield It has risen slightly since President Trump took office due to a combination of factors, including pressure from tariffs and persistent inflation.
On August 24th, Druckenmiller harshly criticized the Treasury Department’s recent decision to more than double the size of its bond buybacks, calling it a “mistake” in an op-ed for the Wall Street Journal.
The announcement comes as yields rise to their highest levels in years. Bond yields fell rapidly as a result of the administration’s actions, but rebounded the next day.
“Liquidity tools cannot be used to get out of the solvency dialogue; they can only postpone the dialogue and increase the final price,” Druckenmiller argued in the op-ed, which he later said was written with the help of AI tools.
Bessent told CNBC on Monday that he has spoken to Druckenmiller since the article was published and that the conversation “went well.”
But the combative Cabinet Secretary also threw back a thinly veiled jab at his friend and mentor.
“Stan is a great investor. He changes his mind a lot and doesn’t like to lose money,” Bessent said. “I think he lost money the day he sent the editorial.”
He added: “My job is to make sure the market focuses on the fundamentals and doesn’t let the market dictate policy.”
“Hedge fund managers like to speed things up,” Bessent added, stressing that the U.S. “is the best-performing bond market, so we don’t know where the weaknesses are.”
Bessent told CNBC in early August that accelerating bond purchases could exceed the announced $4 billion.
