Trump’s new global tariffs kick in at 10% – business live | Business

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Trump’s new global tariffs kick in at 10% – business live | Business

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Introduction: Trump’s new tariffs kick in at 10%

Good morning, and welcome to our rolling coverage of business, the financial markets and the world economy.

President Donald Trump’s new tariffs have come into effect today at a rate of 10%, after the US supreme court blocked many of his import taxes on Friday.

The president signed an executive order last Friday authorising the 10% tariffs just hours after the supreme court ruling. He later threatened to raise the rate to 15%, but did not officially do so by Tuesday 12.01am time in Washington, when the 10% levy came into effect.

However, Bloomberg is reporting that officials in the White House are working on a formal order that will increase the rate to 15%.

It comes after Trump declared this week that he can use tariffs in a “much more powerful and obnoxious way”.

The new tariffs, which Trump is applying under Section 122 of the 1974 Trade Act, have triggered uncertainty with a number of US trading partners, including the UK (which negotiated a 10% rate with the US last year) and the EU.

On Monday the EU paused the process of ratification of the deal it had struck with the US last July for the second time in a month, after it froze and unfroze the deal in the wake of Trump’s Greenland threats. The deal was for 15% blanket tariffs on EU imports that were inclusive of previous levies.

Meanwhile in the UK, a spokesperson for Keir Starmer, when asked whether retaliatory tariffs were an option, said:

No one wants to see a trade war. No one wants to see a situation that’s escalated. But as I say, nothing is off the table at this stage.

The agenda

5am GMT: EU car registrations
11am GMT: CBI Distributive trades for Feb
2pm GMT: Case-Shiller US home price index
2.15pm GMT: Bank of England governor to discuss MPC decision to hold interest rates at 3.75% with the Treasury Committee

Key events

Trump’s new tariffs are at 10% now, but multiple reports suggest that officials in the White House are plotting a path to increase the rate to 15%.

Such an increase would hit the UK particularly hard, as the government had negotiated a rate of 10% on many goods last summer.

Here’s a chart from the independent trade monitoring body Global Trade Alert, which plots out the potential impact of a 15% rate. In that scenario Brazil would enjoy the biggest reduction in average tariff rates, down by 13.6 percentage points, followed by China, with a 7.1 percentage point fall.

Potential impact of 15% tariffs, by Global Trade Alert Illustration: Global Trade Alert

European markets have opened a bit lower this morning, as investors digest the news of Trump’s latest 10% tariff.

The UK’s blue chip FTSE 100 index has dropped 0.25%. In Italy the FTSE MIB has dropped 0.4%, the German Dax is down 0.2% and the French Cac 40 is down by 0.1%.

The Stoxx Europe 600, which tracks the biggest listed companies across the continent, has slipped 0.2%.

The worst performer in Europe so far is the UK-listed student accommodation provider Unite Group, with its shares falling by more than 8% this morning. The company told investors that it had sold fewer student beds last year, after a drop in demand from international applicants.

‘Fresh uncertainty’ for UK businesses exporting goods to the US

William Bain, head of trade policy at the British Chambers of Commerce, warns that while the 10% tariff is not as bad as threats of a 15% rate, the changing policies are making it harder for businesses to plan ahead.

He says:

It is far from clear what will happen next, and whether a higher tariff rate is still on the way. Despite the immediate reprieve, there is fresh uncertainty for UK firms exporting goods to the US.

This makes it very difficult for firms to understand the prices and margins they will be able to secure for their goods, currently under production, for export in several months’ time. Inevitably this will have an impact on their sales and hit the economy.

The BCC has provided government with a six-point plan to guard against the worst economic outcomes from the new tariffs and potential further hikes.

This includes continued negotiation with the US government, engagement with the US Congress, an uplift in UK Export Finance capacity and reviewing the UK’s Global Tariffs.

The risk of further tariff pain to come is still real and the government must do everything it can to prepare for the worst.”

Not everyone was happy that Trump’s “reciprocal” tariffs were deemed illegal by the US supreme court last week.

FedEx has sued the US government, seeking to receive reimbursement of their share of an estimated $175bn in levies after the highest court found Trump had overstepped his authority in issuing the tariffs.

The FedEx lawsuit named as defendants US Customs and Border Protection (CBP), which collects tariffs; the agency’s commissioner Rodney Scott; and the United States of America. The suit was filed in the US court of international trade. The company did not specify an amount in its complaint but said it was seeking a “full refund” for duties paid to the US.

The company said in a statement:

While the supreme court did not address the issue of refunds, FedEx has taken necessary action to protect the company’s rights as an importer of record to seek duty refunds from US Customs and Border Protection.

You can read the full story by my colleague Gabrielle Canon here:

New 10% tariff set to last at least 150 days

Trump’s new global 10% tariff is being applied under Section 122 of the 1974 Trade Act, which allows the president to impose the charge for 150 days without congressional approval.

The president has used this approach after the supreme court ruled that he had violated an emergency-powers law to enact his “reciprocal” tariffs on imported goods from countries around the world.

The new tariffs do have some exemptions, including goods that were part of the North American trade pact between the US, Canada and Mexico. The order also includes an exception for some agricultural goods.

It is not clear yet what the fallout will be. The UK has not ruled out retaliation, with a spokesperson for Keir Starmer saying yesterday that “nothing is off the table”, and the chair of the EU Parliament’s trade committee, Bernd Lange, said yesterday:

We want to have clarity from the US that they are respecting the deal because that’s a crucial element.”

Trump has warned that any country that wants to “play games” with the supreme court decision would be “be met with a much higher Tariff, and worse, than that which they just recently agreed to.” But Jim Reid, of Deutsche Bank, says it is unclear how the president might respond to developments in the UK and the EU.

At the moment the rate is 10% with White House officials stating that they are working on a formal order to raise to 15%. Perhaps the stacking concern is delaying things for now. Late yesterday, we also saw the WSJ and Bloomberg report that the administration was preparing new Section 232 national security investigations into several industries including batteries, telecom equipment and industrial chemicals.

Remember that Trump’s delivering the State of the Union address tonight, so it’s possible we might get a better sense of the next steps on tariffs…net-net we still think the effective tariff rate will fall this year and that the world post-SCOTUS will see lower tariffs than the pre-SCOTUS world.