The nomination ended days of speculation after several other names emerged as competitors to the reported favorite.
Scott Bessent speaks at the National Conservative Conference in Washington on July 10, 2024. Dominic Gwinn/Middle East Images/AFP via Getty Images
By Andrew Moran and Nathan Worcester
President-elect Donald Trump has nominated Scott Bessent to lead the U.S. Department of the Treasury, ending days of speculation after other names emerged as competitors to the reported favorite.
“Scott is widely respected as one of the world’s foremost international investors and geopolitical and economic strategists. Scott’s story is that of the American Dream,” Trump said in a statement on the nomination.
Bessent, 62, is a Wall Street veteran and founder of international macro investment company Key Square Group. He served as a key economic adviser to Trump’s 2024 campaign.
Others rumored as contenders for the role included Howard Lutnick, 63, the chairman and CEO of investment giants Cantor Fitzgerald and BGC Partners. He co-chairs the Trump–Vance transition team, which is in charge of selecting administration candidates, vetting personnel, and crafting policy. Lutnick was ultimately chosen on Nov. 19 to lead the Department of Commerce.
Kevin Warsh, 54, a former investment banker at Morgan Stanley and former Federal Reserve Board governor, likewise entered the conversation. He became the leading candidate for treasury secretary on the betting website Polymarket after reports emerged that the president-elect was expanding his search to fill the position.
Some in Trump’s inner circle had backed Lutnick over Bessent to helm the Treasury Department.
Writing on social media over the weekend, billionaire Elon Musk endorsed Lutnick, saying he “will actually enact change.”
“Bessent is a business-as-usual choice,” Musk wrote on social media platform X on Nov. 16. “Business-as-usual is driving America bankrupt, so we need change one way or another.”
Other Wall Street figures have weighed in on the race.
Anthony Pompliano, founder and CEO of Professional Capital Management, recommended Lutnick for the position.
“I think @howardlutnick would make a fantastic Treasury Secretary,” he wrote on X. “We need smart, successful people in leadership positions!”
Kyle Bass, the hedge fund investor at Hayman Capital Management, thinks that “Lutnick is not Trump’s answer.”
“Scott Bessent is eminently more qualified than Howard Lutnick to run the U.S. Treasury,” Bass said in a Nov. 13 X post. “Scott understands markets, economics, people, and geopolitics better than anyone I’ve ever interacted with. Markets have already anticipated a Bessent choice.”
In response to Bass, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who was tapped to lead the Department of Health and Human Services, disagreed.
“Bitcoin is the currency of freedom, a hedge against inflation for middle class Americans, a remedy against the dollar’s downgrade from the world’s reserve currency, and the offramp from a ruinous national debt,” he said on X. “Bitcoin will have no stronger advocate than Howard [Lutnick].”
Ultimately, says Third Point analyst Dan Loeb, “the only thing that matters is the President’s choice for this important position.”
The incoming treasury secretary will immediately grapple with two files. The first is ensuring the U.S. government avoids a default when the national debt ceiling expires in January 2025. The second is extending the 2017 Tax Cut and Jobs Act, most of which is poised to expire.
Beyond these near-term pursuits, the next treasury secretary will also espouse Trump’s economic policies, particularly on tariffs.
Leading candidates to head the Treasury had, in most cases, been vocal supporters of trade levies, though their strategies differed.
Bessent said in a recent interview with CNBC that tariffs could be “layered in gradually” to allow higher prices to emerge over time and be offset by disinflationary efforts.