As the presidential primary season moves on it becomes more and more clear that Donald Trump may well be the Republican nominee for president of the United States. If “The Donald” should win the presidency what will happen to the markets? CNBC quotes Wedbush saying that stocks will crash 50%.

If Donald Trump becomes the next president, stocks will fall 50 percent, according to Wedbush’s director of equity sales trading.
That’s based on his analysis of the effects Trump’s economic policies would have if the GOP front-runner carried them out as president.

In making his bold call, Ian Winer first looks at Trump’s proposal to cut taxes on the highest-earnings Americans and on corporations, which according to different sources, would reduce government revenue by something in the neighborhood of $10 trillion over the next decade. On the spending side, Trump has promised to bulk up the military and bolster the country’s infrastructure, which could lead to increased rather than reduced expenditures.

“Without any cut in spending, it’s probably going to require somewhere between 8 and 9 percent GDP growth just to make us neutral,” Winer said Tuesday on CNBC’s “Fast Money.”

So, what are the odds that the USA will experience 8 to 9 percent GDP growth? The huge deficit decrease would destroy the US credit position. Deporting 11 illegal aliens would be very costly and would deplete the US labor supply. And the last time the US engaged in a worldwide trade war (Smoot Haley Tariff Act 1930) it led to the Great Depression.

Would the Poor Suffer under Trump?

An additional issue is what increased tariffs would do to the cost of living for America’s poor. This would amount to tax on consumers that by itself could lead to a recession or depression.

What the World Would Look Like under a Trump Presidency

US News joins in the predictions by assessing what the world will look like under President Donald Trump.

The unspectacular truth is that a Trump presidency would probably be marked by the quotidian work of so many other presidents-trying to sell Congress and the public on proposals while fighting off not only a culture of protest but also the usual swarm of lobbyists who kill any interesting idea with ads and donations. Trump has a rarefied confidence in his abilities and, as we recently learned, in his, um, manhood. But what he doesn’t have is a magic wand (insert wand-penis joke here). Remember Schoolhouse Rock? Trump is no match for the American political system, with its three branches of government. The president, as famed political scientist Richard Neustadt once said, has to take an inherently weak position and use the powers of persuasion to get others to do what he wants.

If this analysis is correct a Trump election would not lead to a 50% stock crash because none of his nutty ideas would come to fruition. The three branches of the US government were devised to prevent the kind of excess that Trump proposes. On the other hand do not look to see an economic rally during a Trump presidency either, rather a rather disruptive 4 years before an adult returns to the Oval Office.