Trump reportedly picks Howard Lutnick as commerce secretary

Donald Trump has reportedly picked one of his biggest fundraisers for the position of commerce secretary.

Howard Lutnick, the billionaire founder of the financial firm Cantor Fitzgerald, will be nominated to serve as one of Trump’s principal advisers on commerce and international trade, the news website Axios reported.

Lutnick had been tipped for the more powerful role of treasury secretary, an appointment that had the backing of another powerful Trump fundraiser, the tech billionaire Elon Musk.

Scott Bessent, an investor and hedge fund manager, has been seen as Lutnick’s closest rival for the treasury. On his social media site last week, Musk wrote: “My view fwiw is that Bessent is a business-as-usual choice, whereas @howardlutnick will actually enact change.”

Lutnick was co-chair of Trump’s transition team. He has championed Trump’s plans to use tariffs on foreign imports to build the US economy – a plan many economists believe will lead to rising inflation. He is also a big backer of loosening regulation of cryptocurrencies.

Trump has known Lutnick for decades. A self-described fiscal conservative and social liberal, he has donated to Democrats in the past but recently told the Wall Street Journal that “they have moved away from me”.

Cantor Fitzgerald lost 658 employees in the terrorist attacks on the Twin Towers on 11 September 2001. In the decades since he rebuilt the privately held company, it now employs 13,000 people, up from 2,000 before the tragedy.

It is so far unclear how or if he will separate his vast business interests from his powerful government role.