Nigel Farage: 'Rubbish' to blame Brexit for stock losses

Exclusive interview with UK Independence Party leader

This is a rush transcript from "Your World," June 27, 2016. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

TRISH REGAN, GUEST HOST: Let's get straight to the man at the center of this movement.

U.K. Independence Party leader Nigel Farage joins me right now from Brussels for this exclusive chat.

Welcome, sir.

NIGEL FARAGE, U.K. INDEPENDENCE PARTY LEADER: Thank you.

REGAN: So, you have made a bit of news over there.

Did you ever imagine when this all began that you would shake things up as much as you have?

FARAGE: Well, I started 25 years ago. I took the view that the European project was questioning in the wrong direction, and so I decided to get involved with a new political party.

For the first 10 years, I was laughed at, mocked, derided, called all the names under the sun. And here we are. Over the next 10 to 15 years, we grew, we grew, we grew, we forced the British prime minister into giving us a referendum.

And then what we saw was the global establishment, not just the conservative and Labor parties in Britain, not just the Bank of England, but President Obama, the IMF, the OECD, everyone telling us that dreadful things would happen to us if we didn't stay part of a political union in Brussels, and you know what?

The little people, the real people, the ordinary people, the decent people said no. So, to be honest, I am so happy I can scarcely believe it.

(LAUGHTER)

REGAN: How is it that you think so many people got this wrong, Nigel? rMD-BO_All of the polls were wrong on this. The expectation was, yes, it was going to be tight, but that ultimately people would vote to stay.

FARAGE: Well, I think they wanted to believe that.

And they thought that project fear, or perhaps even project threat, would keep the little people in line, allow the big multinationals, the Goldman Sachses, the people that love the institutions that you can see right here behind me. And they just assumed that would work.

Ultimately, this referendum wasn't decided by economic arguments. It was decided by a basic argument of sovereignty. Should we make our own laws in our own country? And, crucially, should we control our own borders?

Now, immigration, I know, is becoming a hotter issue in American politics right now, too, but just think about this.

REGAN: Sure.

FARAGE: We're a country of 65 million people. Our population is rising by nearly half-a-million people every single year, just because we have got an open border policy with the rest over the European Union.

People said, enough. We want to Govern our own country. We want to make our own laws. We want our own Supreme Court to be supreme and we want to control our borders. And that now is what must happen. Yet, what we're seeing today from S&P and others is the establishment having lost, they haven't quite given in yet.

REGAN: Well, let's talk about that, because S&P today, Standard & Poor's, has given a knock on your credit rating, taking the U.K.'s credit rating down from its really pristine status.

What is that going to mean for the economy and the doomsdayers that are saying this is bad news? You look at what is happening in the markets, you look at what happened with this credit rating, what happens now for your question?

FARAGE: Well, can I just get the markets thing right?

FTSE closed tonight at 6000 there or thereabouts, 9 percent higher than it was in February. So the idea that Brexit is causing stock market losses is rubbish.

(CROSSTALK)

REGAN: No, I mean, you got Barclays trading down nearly 20 percent today. A lot of the British banks are really getting hit hard by this.

FARAGE: Well, one of the reasons Barclays is down is that Barclays took a massive punt on remain winning. They were long sterling at nearly 150, which, by the way, again, a lot higher than it was back in February. And they were long equity.

So, Barclays, frankly, got their losses handed to them on to plate and it served them right for taking the positions that they did. Now, on sterling, let's get some perspective here, too shall we, because, don't forget, before I was in politics, I had a proper job.

REGAN: That's right.

FARAGE: Trading commodities and...

(CROSSTALK)

REGAN: So, you know this stuff.

FARAGE: So I do know -- well, I do, unlike almost everybody else who works in politics.

Sterling entered -- sterling a bear market, declining market, in July 2014. Why? Because every growth expectation in Britain gets marked down, and because our public finances are still way out of control. So this hysteria about markets, let's end that. It's rubbish.

Now, as for S&P...

REGAN: Before but we end it, because I was talking to some people today who said, you know what? London is no longer going to be a financial center for Europe. Your response?

FARAGE: Oh, please. Please. Please, please.

London is not a financial center for Europe. It's a financial center for the world. Europe is becoming a little backyard; 85 percent of the global economy is not in the European Union. And for people who say that unless we stay in a political union governed by unelected old men in Brussels, that somehow that will stop us buying and selling goods and services from each other, clearly, they have no conception of what trade is all about.

Trade is not made by politicians. Trade is not made by bureaucrats. Trade is made by people watching this program. They like a car. They like a bottle of wine. They think the price is right. And they choose to buy it. And we trade, the United Kingdom trades with the E.U. at an annual deficit of 70 billion sterling every year.

We're now the Eurozone's biggest trading partner in the world. And let me tell you something. Hundreds of thousands of jobs in the German car manufacturing sector depend on good trade links with the United Kingdom. So these arguments are spurious. These arguments are being put by a global political elite.

(CROSSTALK)

REGAN: Let me ask you about another argument that is out there. I hear you.

I, for one, agree with you in terms of trade and that's not going away and London will remain a financial center. But the other thing you keep hearing is that there's going to be a systemic problem on the way because if you guys go, then, you know, who is to say France won't go, who is to say Greece or Italy or Portugal won't go next?

FARAGE: Well, let's get a political perspective now where we are with this European Union.

This club was put together back in the 1950s. And the idea was to get the French and Germans around the table to break bread with each other after three wars in 70 years, the last two of which dragged in not just my country, but your country, too. OK?

So, the idea of cooperation, the idea of trade was absolutely sensible, but what this has now become is a political union. They want to build a United States of Europe. That's why they have a flag, an anthem, a president, a police force. It why they want to built an army, which, of course, will ultimately threaten the role of NATO.

And nobody in Europe, no one anywhere, has ever given consent for this. So, frankly, I would say this to you. If the Danes now vote to leave, what's wrong with that? Let's have a Europe of sovereign nation states being friends together, not a false political union.

REGAN: So, how do you confront the threats out there in the way of Vladimir Putin and ISIS, if you're not united together? Can you still be as strong when faced with these challenges?

FARAGE: So, last year, in one of the worst policy decisions we have seen in the world, since 1945, Angela Merkel said, if you want to come across the Mediterranean, regardless what part of the world you come from, regardless of whether you're really a refugee or not, you're welcome.

And 1.8 million people made that crossing last year. When ISIS say they will use the migrant crisis to flood the European continent with their jihadi fighters, I suggest we take them seriously.

And just three weeks ago, the German authorities foiled a bomb plot in Dusseldorf, and all four of those people had come in last year on those migrant boats. And the Germans are now investigating and hunting down another 180 terrorist subjects.

Please don't tell me that being together in the E.U. is making us safer. It's doing quite the reverse.

REGAN: Vladimir Putin, that's the other aspect to all of this.

People are saying, Putin is doing a dance right now. He is thrilled. He wants the Europeans to be less powerful, and he sees this as making them less powerful.

Your response to that, Nigel?

FARAGE: Well, ultimately, let me say this. Vladimir Putin behaved in a more statesmanlike manner than President Obama did in this referendum campaign.

REGAN: How so?

FARAGE: Obama came to Britain. Obama came to Britain, and I think behaved disgracefully, telling us we would be at the back of the queue. I think you guys say line, rather than queue.

Treating us, treating us, America's strongest, oldest ally, in this most extraordinary way. Vladimir Putin maintained his silence throughout the whole campaign. I'm not a fan of Vladimir Putin. But, you know, the Ukrainian crisis actually was sparked by the European Union saying they wanted to extend their borders to take in Ukraine, which Putin took as being a direct threat.

Now, my view on Putin and the Russians is, don't poke the Russian bear with a stick. If you do, you're bound to get a response.

REGAN: So, a more isolationist Britain is what you want to see?

FARAGE: No, a global Britain. Please.

Look, we are the world's fifth largest economy, and yet because we're part of this outdated customs union, big business cartel, we are prohibited and forbidden from making our own trade deals, our own relationships globally.

REGAN: Let me ask you this.

FARAGE: That -- that for a country that speaks English, a country that is mercantile by its history, is mad. We are leaving a failed political union and we're rejoining a bigger, better, modern 21st century world.

REGAN: What does this mean for us here in the U.S.? One commentator made the point to me today that he thought it was good, that we have historically had a great relationship with you guys, and that we actually may have a better one because you're more potentially with us as opposed to, say, Europe. Thoughts?

FARAGE: Well, I would say this to you.

Militarily, the direction the European Union is going in threatens NATO, and the fact we have opted out of all of that means that the two of us together can continue to be the closest military allies in the world.

And in terms of trade, let's get rid of these idiots bureaucrats based here in Brussels, and why don't we together, Britain and America, cut our own trade deal and have a better, stronger, deeper relationship? We now with that historic, seismic vote last Thursday are free to come and talk to you as Americans as an independent country, and let's make our ties even closer than they are today.

REGAN: I just got about 60 second left.

But a lot of people are comparing what you guys just went through to what we are going through right now. Do you see the similarities?

FARAGE: No.

Your position -- and you may have your problems -- is nothing like ours. We finished off until last Thursday with 70 percent of our laws being made by foreign institutions, with our own Supreme Court being overruled in Luxembourg, and with an open border to 500 million people.

Whatever problems you have got in the USA, they are nothing to what we have had as part this Europe. And what we did last Thursday is, we said, we want our country back. And we voted for it. And we have got it back.

REGAN: Yes. Kind of an independence day for you guys.

Nigel, thank you very much.

FARAGE: Absolutely.

REGAN: Good to see you, sir.

FARAGE: Thank you.

REGAN: All right.

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