Tariffs
-
Facing a global market meltdown, President Donald Trump on Wednesday abruptly backed down on his tariffs on most nations for 90 days but raised his tax rate on Chinese imports to 125%.
https://apnews.com/live/stock-market-economy-tariffs-updates-4-9-2025
-
Amid escalating trade tensions between China and the United States, some Chinese exporters are taking the drastic step of ditching shipments mid-voyage and surrendering containers to shipping companies to avoid crushing tariff costs.
Industry insiders have dubbed the move “preparing for the Long March”, a grim metaphor for what many see as a prolonged and punishing downturn in cross-Pacific trade.
A staff member at a China-listed export company, who requested anonymity, said its US-bound container volume had plummeted from 40 to 50 containers a day to just three to six as a result of the new tariffs on Chinese imports imposed by the second Trump administration. It has increased tariffs by 104 per cent this year, taking the total impost to around 115 per cent.
The new tariffs have triggered a backlash from Beijing and sent shock waves through global markets.
“We’ve halted all shipping plans from the Philippines, Vietnam, Indonesia and Malaysia,” the employee said. “Every factory order is halted. Anything that hasn’t been loaded will be scrapped, and the cargo already at sea is being re-costed.”
One client had told the company it was abandoning goods already on the water and giving them to the shipping company, as “no one will buy them after the tariffs are imposed”.
Reporting from South China Morning Post:
-
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told reporters at the White House that the tumult in the market came because investors didn’t understand Trump’s tariff strategy.
“The market didn’t understand, those were maximum levels. The countries can think about those levels as they come to us to bring down their tariffs, their non-trade barriers,” Bessent said.
He said Trump “created maximum negotiating leverage for himself” and the Chinese have “shown themselves to the world as the bad actors”
insert eyeroll here
-
All this on again/off again stuff must be real comforting for companies trying to plan ahead
-
I thought the same thing.
-
Op-ed praising Trump's genius tariffs moves, comparing Trump to Tuft, McKinley, Ford, Reagan:
-
Meanwhile, Australia rebuffs China's overtures...
Australia has swiftly turned down China's offer to "join hands" against Donald Trump's tariffs, as Washington escalates its trade war with Beijing.
The White House recently imposed an import tax of 10% on Australian goods, but for China - Australia's biggest trading partner - raised tariffs to 125%.
China's ambassador to Australia Xiao Qian argued joint resistance is "the only way" to stop the "hegemonic and bullying behaviour of the US", appealing for Canberra's cooperation in an opinion piece on Thursday.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, however, said Australians would "speak for ourselves", while the country's defence minister said the nation would not be "holding China's hand".
"It's about pursuing Australia's national interests, not about making common calls with China," Richard Marles told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.
