Author: Alex Kozul-Wright
Published on: 03/04/2025 | 00:00:00
AI Summary:
Trump announced a 10 percent “minimum baseline tariff” on nearly all imports into the United States on Wednesday. Higher duties on targeted countries will be phased in shortly afterwards. He claimed the new import taxes were designed to reduce trade deficits and bring foreign manufacturing back to US shores. Vietnam will be tariffed at 46 percent, and Thailand 36 percent. Mexico and Canada, the US’s two largest trading partners and its immediate neighbours, were missing from the list. Reciprocal tariffs will not apply to some goods such as copper, semiconductors, energy, and “certain minerals that are not available in the United States” US tariffs on China are now effectively at 54 percent. Beijing stopped short of saying it would impose retaliatory countermeasures. Taiwan labelled the tariffs “highly unreasonable” Canada is one of several US trading partners which has pledged to respond to tariffs with retaliatory measures. The European Union is “ready for a trade war” with the US and could “attack online services”, French government spokesperson Sophie Primas said. The Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 2.6 percent on Wednesday, auguring near-term losses for US companies. Germany’s DAX index fell by 1.7 percent on Thursday, while the CAC 40 in Paris shed 1.8 percent. Japan’s Nikkei 225 index dipped by 4 percent briefly on Thursday.
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