Wall Street Eyes Harris -- and Her Big Choices

One outcome of the Democratic National Convention is the rising chatter about who could get tapped for top cabinet posts. Business leaders are looking for reassurance from these potential picks, for signals that Kamala Harris won’t be as tough on corporate America as her campaign suggested in its early days.

In conversations with a few prominent donors in Chicago and Wall Street advisers to the Harris campaign, there are some names that seem to offer more comfort than others.

Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo and Penny Pritzker, the billionaire heiress of the family behind Hyatt Hotels, are seen as potential pro-business options for Treasury Secretary in a Harris administration. Brian Deese and Wally Adeyemo both worked at BlackRock before joining the Biden adminstration, and are also among the names being floated to see if they can capture the imagination of supporters.

For Secretary of Commerce, former American Express chief executive officer Ken Chenault’s resume has appeal. Now the chair of venture capital firm General Catalyst, Chenault held a senior role with the Business Roundtable, a key advocacy group for large industries, and has been a board member of multiple Fortune 500 firms. Business leaders are also keen on Centerview Partners CEO Blair Effron — a prominent investment banker who has been a key donor in the Harris campaign in 2020.

When it comes to climate and energy policy, Tom Steyer, a billionaire investor who sought the Democratic nomination for president in 2020, could play a key role.

At the DNC, Wall Street leaders were among Harris’ prominent supporters. Chenault and Tom Nides, a senior official at private equity giant Blackstone Inc. who previously served in the Biden administration, and Ray McGuire, the president of Lazard and a longtime investment banker, were present; McGuire’s wife, Crystal McCrary McGuire, is also a longtime Harris supporter.

Charm Offensive

Harris “is for all Americans,”?Chenault said during a speech at the convention. “She understands it’s possible, in fact, necessary, for a president to be both pro-business and pro-worker. Kamala Harris understands that government must work in partnership with the business community. She knows that a market-based economy needs a strong and effective government.”

As Vice President, Harris has “spent more time than people realize meeting with companies, the private sector, CEOs,” Charles Myers, the founder of advisory firm Signum Global and a high-level Democratic bundler, said in an interview at the convention. “Now that she’s the candidate, people realize they know her a little better — and they like her.”

Harris’ “charm offensive” has taken her across corporate America, meeting with heads of companies including JPMorgan, CVS and Visa. Yet some of Harris’s early communications have pointed to some really tough policies. Economists, even those that have served in Democratic administrations, have been critical of her proposed ban on price-gouging on grocery costs.

Wall Street is also wary of the rent caps proposed by the Biden administration, a policy that would have severe impacts on housing economics in the US. unclear how exactly this would play out in a Harris White House. She’s promised to aggressively increase housing supply — a huge win for the companies that finance the building and buying of those homes.

Harris’ supporters aren’t naive about what a Democratic victory would mean for taxes. Cuts passed during Donald Trump’s tenure are set to expire at the end of next year. “I don’t think it’s unrealistic to talk about increasing rates,” Alan Patricof, a longtime venture capitalist and Democratic donor who now runs Primetime Partners, said on Bloomberg Television. “I’m in a high tax bracket, I can’t deny that, but I think there needs to be more income equality in this country.”

A Harris administration could also resurrect a conversation about taxing carried interest, along with higher taxes on capital gains. A number of financial executives — who tend to be fiscal conservatives — think child tax credits or housing tax credits could spur inflation, undermining the tentative progress that’s been made on that front.

But ultimately, very few of these same critics believe that that their most feared policies could pass a divided Congress. One prominent Trump donor said he’s grown more impressed with Harris and wished Trump would more aggressively tout his own economic policies.

With one month down — and less than three to the general election — the Harris campaign has been heavy on themes of hope, joy and economic opportunity but light on specifics, as my Bloomberg colleagues highlight in today’s Big Take.

The silver lining for big business? “There’s a growing realization that who she is today is much more pro-business, centrist than who people thought she was in the past, being a progressive from California,” Myers says. “With Wall Street or financial services, in the end — they always want to back the winner. And we’re starting to see people switch over, and write some pretty big checks.”

More to come. As always, tips, opinions, and ideas can be sent over to [email protected] . Looking forward to hearing from you.