Trump’s tweets aren’t the norm: warning about the fentanyl crisis in the wake of a new trade war
Japan, Europe and South Korea didn’t even get mentioned in Trump’s announcement, but their stocks fell as well. That suggests rising fears that a new trade war could scramble global supply chains and dent profits.
On Truth Social, Trump stated that he wants to impose 25 percent tariffs on all Canadian and Mexican products. He also wants an “additional” 10 percent tariff on imports from China, which Trump blames for the fentanyl crisis, a charge that Beijing has repeatedly disputed.
The bounce today has been reversed by yesterday’s losses. Investors were relieved after Trump picked Scott Bessent, the market-friendly hedge fund mogul, to run the Treasury Department.
It is Trump who is calling the shots, according to the reverberations. The president-elect has made no secret of his desire to use tariffs to further his America-first agenda, and he has yet to announce his pick to be U.S. Trade Representative. Robert Lighthizer is one of the tariff supporters.
The latest threats from Trump may be a negotiating tactic. Bill Ackman, the billionaire financier, believes in that belief. But they are a reminder of how Trump set off alarm bells across diplomatic channels and international markets during his first term often via social media posts. “Waking up to check the tweets for any policy announcements could become the norm,” Mohit Kumar, an economist at Jefferies, wrote in a note this morning.
U.S. auto industry is integrated under Trump’s free trade agreement, as seen by Jungmeyer, an expert on the USDA-North American supply chain
A key example is the U.S. auto industry, which has grown up under the North American Free Trade Agreement and the successor treaty that Trump signed in 2020.
Scott Lincicome, a trade expert with the libertarian CATO institute, says that people do not understand how integrated the North American supply chain is.
“You would see an immediate spike [in prices] at the grocery store. You would see restaurants changing their menus so they could reduce the amount of produce that goes into their plates, or raising prices.”
One example of a price increase due to the tariffs is that of avocados, which would go up less than three weeks before the Super Bowl.
Shoppers would see higher prices throughout the produce department, since Mexico and Canada supply 32% of the fresh fruit and 34% of the fresh vegetables sold in the U.S.
Lance Jungmeyer is the president of the FreshProduce Association of the Americas, and he says Trump’s goal was to reduce grocery store prices.
Trudeau says he spoke to Trump by phone. The President of Mexico sent a letter to the president-elect. Both foreign leaders have called for cooperation.
Source: Trump’s tariffs may be targeted at others — but they could impact you too
How much tariffs on seamless trade would be bad for American workers and the American economy, says one U.S. automaker Xi Jin
A car seat can travel across international borders five or six times before it arrives in a made-in-America automobile, he says. A 25% tariffs on seamless trade would be terrible for American manufacturing workers and the American economy.
