video transcript

U.S. President Barack Obama told NBC's Meet the Press that if Congress fails to avert the fiscal cliff, it will impact financial markets. (SOUNDBITE) (English) U.S. PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA SAYING (ENGLISH): "If people start seeing that on January 1st this problem still hasn't been solved, that we haven't seen the kind of deficit reduction that we could have had had the Republicans been willing to take the deal that I gave them ... then obviously that's going to have an adverse reaction in the markets," Without a deal $600 billion in tax hikes and federal spending cuts will begin to take effect January 1st. Obama signaled he was cautiously optimistic a deal can get done. (SOUNDBITE) (English) U.S. PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA SAYING (ENGLISH): "But we don't yet see an agreement. And now the pressure's on Congress to produce," The Senate is scheduled to hold a rare Sunday session in the afternoon and the House is expected to convene as well.