Indiana State Treasurer Talks Tariffs and Their Impact

STATEWIDE–Indiana State Treasurer Daniel Elliott believes Indiana is on solid financial ground despite the Trump tariffs taking effect.

You might have heard about Trump imposing tariffs on major trading partners, including China, Canada, and Mexico. He also suspended American financial contributions to the World Trade Organization (WTO), and announced plans for a “reciprocal tariff policy” on Wednesday.

“Our investment portfolio is extremely diverse. In fact, we’ve built in a lot of risk mitigation into Indiana’s investment portfolio just for times like this. We’ve had ups and downs in our economy. But while a lot of people our chasing yield, we’re always looking at safety and liquidity first. Then yield is number three, so it’s last on the list,” said Elliott in a Thursday morning interview with WIBC’s Tony Katz.

Elliott said the State of Indiana made $500 million in the last fiscal year.

“We’re set to make an additional $500 million in revenue for this upcoming year. That’s going to be $1 billion over two years,” said Elliott.

Liquidity refers to the efficiency or ease with which an asset or security can be converted into ready cash without affecting its market price. In finance, yield refers to the amount of relative profit or loss generated on an investment over a period of time.

Elliott also says he doesn’t fault President Trump for initiating the tariffs because “the trade war got started a long time ago.”

“President Trump is a good negotiator. He says ‘This has got to stop and we’re going to fight back a little bit here. I think these tariffs will boost Indiana because we are a top producer of steel. We are a top manufacturing producer,” said Elliott.