Investors betting on Trump climbing down may be too optimistic, writes Hargreaves Lansdown’s Susannah Streeter in today’s Notebook

Trump adds more loopdiloops to investment rollercoaster

After the spring rollercoaster ride on financial markets, induced by the trade turmoil unleashed by the Trump administration, there’s been a welcome lull and a further rebound in confidence. The Hargreaves Lansdown investor confidence survey for June shows that confidence in the US market has rebounded 22 per cent, compared to last month. But the fairground ride of tariffs distractions is far from over, particularly now that conflict is raging between Israel and Iran.

As far as trade is concerned, we’ve moved to a bumper car scenario with Trump taking nations on a speedy course of tariff negotiations, before braking abruptly and making about turns, and bringing markets to a standstill in the process. Tariff-induced price rises have, for now, been kept in check, but stagflation is the spectre that could still emerge from the fairground House of Horrors. The world bank is forecasting that the US economy looks set to slow sharply this year, and retailers are flagging they’ll........

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