An even more unpredictable Donald Trump is the world economy’s worst nightmare

November 4, 2026 — 7:54pm

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Reserve Bank governor Michele Bullock doesn’t do snark.

But she was snark-adjacent on Tuesday afternoon during her press conference in which she explained the bank’s decision to whack the economy with its fifth rate rise this year.

The first case of Bullock near-snark appeared when she was asked about a particular economist who had argued the bank needed to push the official cash rate beyond 6 per cent while other experts had warned the RBA was likely to push the country into recession.

“One thing they have in common is they are entirely certain about what needs to be done,” she said of the critics. “I am not and I admit that.”

It was as polite a put-down of the chattering economic class as you’ll ever see from Bullock.

Chalmers flags budget cuts to fight inflation as interest rates hit 4.85 per cent

At the end of her hour-long press conference, Bullock was asked whether the bank had erred last year by cutting interest rates. The bank sliced the cash rate to 3.6 per cent in three separate moves taken in February, May and August.

For those with short memories, the May cut was the first time the RBA had met after President Donald Trump announced his liberation day tariffs.

The bank’s preliminary analysis suggested an ongoing trade war would drive the economy into a recession and lift the jobless rate by almost two full percentage points. So........

© The Sydney Morning Herald