After Trump's tariffs hit the U.S. stock market hard, America's top pension funds lost $169 billion
Trump's tariff plan triggered a sharp decline in the stock market. In just four trading days (from April 3 to April 8), the top 25 public pension funds in the United States saw a paper loss of $169 billion. According to a report by the nonprofit organization Equable, these funds have accumulated losses of approximately $249 billion this year. The organization pointed out that if higher tariffs lead to a prolonged economic recession, the cash flow of these pension institutions will become tighter in the coming years
The Trump tariff bomb triggers a pension crisis, with America's top pension funds evaporating $169 billion in four days.
According to CCTV News, on April 2nd local time, the White House announced that Trump would impose a 10% "baseline tariff" on all countries and higher "reciprocal tariffs" on countries with the largest trade deficits with the U.S., which led to a sharp decline in U.S. stock indices.
On Friday, according to the latest report released by the New York non-profit organization Equable Institute, in the four trading days following President Trump's announcement of the global tariff plan (from April 3 to April 8), the market value of the top 25 state and local public pension investment funds in the U.S. evaporated by approximately $169 billion.
The research organization pointed out that these top pension funds have accumulated losses of about $249 billion so far this year. Even more concerning is that the actual total losses of the entire U.S. public pension system may be much higher than this figure.
Equable warned that this wave of market crash is truly the worst-case scenario for pension funds that are already "cash-strapped":
"The market shocks of the past few days are the type of risk events that the pension system is most reluctant to face."
In addition to paper losses, the organization also noted that pensions are long-term investments that emphasize stability, and the current macroeconomic uncertainty may affect their returns in the coming years. Furthermore, if higher tariffs lead to a prolonged economic recession, cash flow will become even tighter in the coming years.
These 25 pension funds are not small players; they are institutions that manage many retirement accounts and handle large sums of money, making them heavyweight players in the U.S. pension sector. Equable stated that its estimation is based on the asset reports of each fund as of April 8 and is extrapolated using the S&P 500 index as a benchmark