23 ms·

Trump temporarily drops tariffs to 10% for most countries

• tlogan 2y ago
  So we celebrate 10% tariffs. Lol
• bhouston 2y ago
  If anyone had advanced warning, you could have made a fortune today: https://www.marketwatch.com/livecoverage/stock-market-today-dow-eyes-700-point-dive-s-p-500-nasdaq-fall-treasury-yields-spike-as-tariffs-hit?mod=home_lead https://www.marketwatch.com/livecoverage/stock-market-today-...
  • sigwinch 2y ago
    Learned their lesson and formed a whole new Signal group.
  • thenayr 2y ago
    [dead]
  • carabiner 2y ago
    I bought VOO and AMZN yesterday. First time buying an individual stock since pandemic. Kicking myself for not buying more. Still waiting a week to possibly buy more if there's another shock, but if the market's up, I'll buy less.
    • ackbar03 2y ago
      That's stock speculation for you, everything you do is wrong in retrospect
      • carabiner 2y ago
        I just buy during big fucking crises, either individual stocks or index funds. Front page of the NYT type shit, "existential threats" to 100+ year old concerns. Boeing, Toyota, pandemic. Such opportunities only come up every 2-3 years or so. Sell after 1-2 years to get the lower tax rate.
        • fragmede 2y ago
          DCA and time in market beat trying to time the market. If you're doing nothing all day but refreshing Twitter and Robinhood maybe there's some alpha but that's too much involvement for me.
          • immibis 2y ago
            The first sentence is a thought-terminating cliche and is not true. Correctly guessing the shape of the Trump tariff crash was worth an entire year in the market. Crashes that don't instantly reverse themselves tend to be more like ten years.
            • fragmede 2y ago
              yes but unfortunately for me, I don't have insider information or a time machine. If you had $10,000 today, where would you put it?
              • carabiner 2y ago
                VOO, QQQM, AMZN. Value cost averaging. Put more in as it drops, less if it increases.
              • immibis 2y ago
                Not America any more. That Ponzi scheme has just been popped.
      • 0cf8612b2e1e 2y ago
        Feels equally plausible that there would have been an across the board increase in tariffs just to look tough. There is no logical analysis of the current situation.
    • outer_web 2y ago
      Be careful with Amazon, the algos seem to have not realized China is still being tariffed.* * Observation valid for the next 30 seconds. Certain restrictions apply.
  • bgirard 2y ago
    Lots of stocks are up 10-15% instantly after this announcement. Curious if we'll get reports of suspicious options volume capitalizing on this information.
    • NooneAtAll3 2y ago
      why do people still trust stock markets if manipulating them is that easy?
      • NewJazz 2y ago
        As easy as winning the presidency and having enough loyalty within your base to say "I could stand in the middle of 5th Avenue and shoot somebody and I wouldn't lose voters." then win reelection just 8 years later? https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/donald-trump-fifth-avenue-comment/ https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/donald-trump-fifth-avenue-...
      • hn_throwaway_99 2y ago
        Your question presupposes something I think that most people do not believe.
      • taeric 2y ago
        To be clear, here, this form of "manipulation" is kind of impossible to really deal with? Or do you have something in mind that should be able to more smoothly work with this?
        • kevin_thibedeau 2y ago
          SEC has reversed suspicious trades in the past.
          • taeric 2y ago
            From the president of the united states? Especially knowing that controlling tariffs and such are easily argued to be in his core powers, in the current setting, what authority would they possibly have to do something on this?
  • arewethereyeta 2y ago
    [flagged]
  • jajuuka 2y ago
    I'm sure this will be a talking point for the next couple years. "I caused the biggest surge in the stock market in 5 years."
    • codedokode 2y ago
      I think he prefers a phrase "in American history ever".
  • 0x5f3759df-i 2y ago
    Like if the president had posted that “now is a great time to buy DJT” 15 minutes before announcing the pause?
    • AnotherGoodName 2y ago
      Spy went from 497 to 505 by 1:05pm (announcement was later at 1:18pm). Then onwards to 530+. Clearly some listened or simply had knowledge the announcement was coming.
    • deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
    • BJones12 2y ago
      Regardless of whatever happened today, it's never a good time to buy $DJT because 1) it's not profitable and 2) holders are slowly continually liquidating in a complicated manner explained by past Money Stuff articles.
      • torlok 2y ago
        The actual quote is "THIS IS A GREAT TIME TO BUY!!! DJT", which makes DJT either a signature and a call to buy the market if he can form a valid sentence, or a call to buy NASDAQ:DJT if he can't form a valid sentence. Take your pick. It's market manipulation either way.
        • dualbus 2y ago
          On DJT: Donald John Trump.
  • dboreham 2y ago
    Actually you did have advance warning because there has been several days of wall-to-wall finance bro and republican heads on TV saying the tariffs were batshit crazy. Under those conditions there are only two outcomes: 1. the tariffs were rolled back or 2. Trump is removed from office (and the tariffs rolled back).
    • emseetech 2y ago
      Those aren't guaranteed. I do believe Trump is in danger of being removed if the economic damage of the tariffs becomes too great since the one thing truly sacrosanct in America is the economy. But the timeline would hardly be immediate. We'd have to go through considerable pain before the government would act.
      • Terr_ 2y ago
        > Those aren't guaranteed. Yeah, if we lived in that world, Trump would have been removed from office during his first term for all the crimes. It's worth noting that impeaching and removing Trump from office now would actually take fewer votes than the business of overriding the import taxes he's trying to impose with "Canadian fentanyl is scary" emergency powers. As a big bonus, voting to remove him entirely leaves everyone far safer. He's gonna have a guaranteed tantrum of scorched-earth revenge no matter what you do, but this way he won't have official power to do it with.
    • readthenotes1 2y ago
      3. Carve outs are made for high dollar donors like AAPL (which went up with everything else even though it is now subject to an even more terrific tariff) Trump's whole schtick was that #1 - - get countries to negotiate. Except China. The USA gets 25% of it's bandages from there, and that's no way to prepare to defend Taiwan.
  • whalesalad 2y ago
    By the same token, 24 hours and a tweet can have it all come crashing down once again. Nothing is real anymore.
  • gorgoiler 2y ago
    The first order fraud would be market manipulation run by the commander in chief. The second order play would be for Trump to tip his associates off that he was going to do this and let them profit handsomely from the bump. Congratulations Mr President: your lackies love you because they profited from fraud but moreover you now have grade A kompromat on all of them in the form of your Signal chat records showing they were complicit in market fraud!
  • Terr_ 2y ago
    Remember how every other President put their assets into a blind trust? Shit like this is why! It deterred them from firebombing the entire goddamn economy to make a buck for their friends and followers!
    • fragmede 2y ago
      Jimmy Carter's peanut farm remembers.
    • WillAdams 2y ago
      I remember how Jimmy Carter had to sell the family farm because it was viewed as a potential conflict of interest and how Mitt Romney's father, when making his run, when asked for a single year of tax returns made them all public, arguing that a single year could easily be manipulated to show anything, and that only by seeing the entirety of multiple years could an accurate evaluation be made.
      • opo 2y ago
        >I remember how Jimmy Carter had to sell the family farm because it was viewed as a potential conflict of interest ... Are you sure you remember that? Jimmy Carter put his farm in a blind trust, he didn't sell it. https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/factcheck/2023/02/24/fact-check-jimmy-carter-put-peanut-farm-blind-trust-during-term-president/11340029002/ https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/factcheck/2023/02/24/fac...
        • WillAdams 2y ago
          Fair. https://www.tastingtable.com/1204239/why-president-jimmy-carter-gave-up-his-peanut-farm/ https://www.tastingtable.com/1204239/why-president-jimmy-car... notes: >Carter sold all his personal stocks, and he put his interest in Carter Warehouse and Carter Farms into a blind trust.
    • grandempire 2y ago
      Trump is already a billionaire and is in his 70s. No explanation of his behavior in terms of gaining money makes sense.
  • chevman 2y ago
    Learn about limit and stop loss orders, come in handy in times of high volatility I am finding :)
  • thrownaway561 2y ago
    when the market dropped 1100 points in a day was the time to buy. Buy the DIP!!!
    • outer_web 2y ago
      Uh if tariffs weren't paused it would have kept dipping.
    • mnky9800n 2y ago
      Always buy the dip. Because if the dip keeps dipping long enough you got other problems to deal with.
    • JKCalhoun 2y ago
      Catch the falling knife!
  • SpicyLemonZest 2y ago
    Notably, there was a headline that went viral on Twitter earlier this week that the White House was considering this, but after they denied it it was widely understood at the time to be fake news. How many of the people spreading it, I wonder, knew it was really true?
  • cm2187 2y ago
    Probably lots of happy white house staffers and congressmen today.
  • kart23 2y ago
    https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/114308272725981913 https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/1143082727259... > THIS IS A GREAT TIME TO BUY!!! - @realDonaldTrump today at 6:37 AM PST
    • java-man 2y ago
      How is this legal??
      • deleted 2y ago
        [deleted]
      • echoangle 2y ago
        Doesn't matter if it is, he would just pardon himself. Edit: On second thought, he wouldn't even have to, since he already has immunity anyways.
        • glitchinc 2y ago
          Using a personal account to post comments to social media is not an official act.
          • dralley 2y ago
            The entire concept of "official act" does not actually exist. It wasn't defined in the Constitution, and neither was it defined by the Supreme Court when they invented it from whole cloth.
          • blasphemers 2y ago
            Courts have already determined it's an official act by Congressman and Senators to shield them from defamation lawsuits.
          • echoangle 2y ago
            How sure are you that the supreme court agrees with you?
• deleted 2y ago
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• deleted 2y ago
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• lysace 2y ago
  My dream scenario: The rest of the world would band together and upper the mininum tariffs levels against US imports to 10% for 90 days.
  • thehappypm 2y ago
    [flagged]
    • lysace 2y ago
      And offered 0% tariffs on all physical goods (that includes agriculture) weeks ago. But no, Trump is financially illiterate and doesn't understand the concept of VAT.
    • bboygravity 2y ago
      39% on agricultural imports from the US. Lee Kuan Yew referred to Europe as "fort Europa" for a reason many decades ago..
      • thiht 2y ago
        We don’t want a race to the bottom when it comes to agricultural products. American products are cheap but they suck. Ours are better but more expensive. Making American crap expensive is good for us. That’s a good use of tariffs: avoiding flooding the market with inferior products at the cost of local made.
      • MaxHoppersGhost 2y ago
        Most countries have tariffs on the US. The media would have us believe Americans are the first ones to ever do it.
    • Icingdeath 2y ago
      I think it's not that bad, when you consider all goods ands services: "For technical reasons, there is not one “absolute” figure for the average tariffs on EU-US trade, as this calculation can be done in a variety of ways which produce quite varied results. Nevertheless, considering the actual trade in goods between the EU and US, in practice the average tariff rate on both sides is approximately 1%. In 2023, the US collected approximately €7 billion of tariffs on EU exports, and the EU collected approximately €3 billion on US exports." https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/qanda_25_541 https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/qanda_...
• andrethegiant 2y ago
  [flagged]
  • bboygravity 2y ago
    [flagged]
    • ChocolateGod 2y ago
      What countries have lowered their tariffs?
    • basisword 2y ago
      ...he didn't. The EU just announced retaliatory tariffs a few hours ago. China is also retaliating in a big way.
    • tines 2y ago
      Source?
    • j_maffe 2y ago
      Source?
    • matsemann 2y ago
      What countries lowered their tariffs? I've only seen other countries apply their own back.
    • deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
    • behole 2y ago
      Does the cognitive dissonance come bundled with the Chinese made red hat or is it sold separately?
• doener 2y ago
  [flagged]
  • rvnx 2y ago
    I'm tired of winning.
    • p_ing 2y ago
      At least I'm "winning" my 401k and stock portfolio back... Sigh
      • ta1243 2y ago
        I made a fortune. Sold my play account about 3 weeks ago, put 50% back into the S&P yesterday morning. Just sold it again. It's great if you're up for some gambling.
    • doener 2y ago
      No, we have to keep winning. We have to win moooore!
      • kevin_thibedeau 2y ago
        He only wins when his competition throws the game on purpose.
  • slashdev 2y ago
    Textbook. His textbook. Art of the deal. He's not unstable, just very aggressive. He did have a plan. We can argue about the merits of his plan, but dismissing him and his advisors as stupid or insane is underestimating them.
    • margalabargala 2y ago
      Exactly. He has run a lot of businesses in the past, with consistent results. When running the US, he'll apply similar strategies, and we'll have a similar result.
• martinky24 2y ago
  How can anyone take him seriously on this sort of stuff? He flip/flops constantly. If he isn't a serious negotiator, other countries/companies aren't going to take his threats seriously.
  • lysace 2y ago
    *How can anyone take the US seriously? Also see: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c5yrr0e7499o https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c5yrr0e7499o > Confidence in the US economy is plummeting as investors dumped government debt amid growing concerns over the impact of Donald Trump's tariffs. > Governments sell bonds - essentially an IOU - to raise money from financial markets for public spending and in return they pay interest. > The US does not normally see high interest rates on its debt as its bonds are viewed as a safe investment, but on Wednesday rates spiked sharply to touch 4.5%
    • jeetoid 2y ago
      Any reasonable person does.
      • lysace 2y ago
        Well, we used to.
      • justin66 2y ago
        In the sense that people "take seriously" a drunkard waving a gun around.
      • werdnapk 2y ago
        And that's a problem... reasonable people now don't.
    • meepmorp 2y ago
      > How can anyone take the US seriously? we can wipe out humanity if we get cranky
• MaxPock 2y ago
  [dead]
• matteoraso 2y ago
  Doesn't help America as much as some people might think. The world has seen that Trump is erratic, and America imports too much from China to just ignore the 125% (!!!) tariff on the country.
  • linguae 2y ago
    Exactly. The damage has been done; the fact that economic policy could dramatically change day-by-day makes investing and planning very difficult. In addition, the tariffs on China are insane. One of my biggest concerns is the value of the dollar. If foreigners are discouraged from doing business with America either due to tariffs or due to other matters, how does this affect the dollar, which is a fiat currency? The US dollar is currently the world's reserve currency, which is the result of the United States' emerging victorious from WWII while Britain, holder of the world's previous reserve currency (the pound), had to contend with rebuilding as well as dealing with the loss of its empire. Fiat currencies, by definition, are not backed by assets, but are instead backed by "faith"; not in the religious sense, but in the faith that people have in the government issuing the currency. How will the world keep the faith if the custodian of the dollar acts so recklessly? For many years I've been concerned about deficit spending and easy-money policies from central banks. However, for the past few months I've become very concerned about Trump's policies that alienate our allies and partners. What Trump and the rest of MAGA simply do not understand is that the United States is part of an interconnected world. American strength is more than just weaponry; it's also in our economy and our reputation. Unfortunately Trump and his cabinet have done extraordinary damage to our nation in less than three months. He's like an angry man with a baseball bat smashing up irreplaceable artifacts in a museum, and sadly there is no police to stop him, because he is the chief of police. He is by far the worst president America has ever had to endure, and if this continues our nation will end up at war, either with itself or with other nations.
    • tines 2y ago
      America will get the outcome it deserves.
  • misantroop 2y ago
• loevborg 2y ago
  The Chinese are warning their citizens about travel to the U.S. > China issued an alert warning its citizens and students of the potential risk of traveling in the U.S. and attending schools there. > > “Recently, due to the deterioration of China-US economic and trade relations and the domestic security situation in the United States, the Ministry of Culture and Tourism reminds Chinese tourists to fully assess the risks of traveling to the United States and be cautious,” the ministry said in an alert. Can't blame them honestly
  • fifilura 2y ago
    [flagged]
    • bllguo 2y ago
      yea the government is scaring them, not anything the US is doing. sure. the mental gymnastics know no bounds
      • pb7 2y ago
        What is the US doing to Chinese visitors?
        • StefanBatory 2y ago
          https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/apr/06/chinese-woman-border-patrol-arizona-suicide https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/apr/06/chinese-woma...
          • pb7 2y ago
            The US forced her to overstay her visa and commit suicide?
  • jeetoid 2y ago
    [flagged]
  • 2y ago
• NewJazz 2y ago
  Hmm curious that they gutted SEC before pulling this nonsense rather than afterward.
  • outer_web 2y ago
    I think the DOJ handles these things. Oh, also gutted. And also it doesn't matter because immunity.
• davidw 2y ago
  One thing companies love is lots of uncertainty like this. It keeps their accountants entertained! "Maybe we should build a factory in the US" ... 24 hours later ... "well, not today". What's really amazing is all the muttering from "Very Important Wall Street" type people who are saying that he's insane. Like... with that kind of salary, weren't you paying attention? We've known he wasn't right in the head for a while now. Maybe they should be replaced by AI.
  • thrance 2y ago
    It's a confirmation to those that still needed it that finance people are stupid and ideologically blinded. Trump's been speaking of tariffs for years, what made them think his mandate would be good for them?
  • vkou 2y ago
    They always knew he was an idiot, the reason they are muttering is to give ammunition and support to anyone who will push back on this insanity.
  • valzam 2y ago
    Absolutely no one was seriously considering building a factory in the US based on the insansity of last week
    • timewizard 2y ago
      Thailand is a good example. They have about $40b (USD) in balance of trade going the wrong way. Their initial ideas were simply to import more american petroleum, vehicles and aircraft. This likely could have accounted for more than half the difference and significantly reduced their tariff rate by just changing suppliers of already imported products. The US news is pretty useless here. It's more nuanced than they would like to admit. Foreign sources of news are the most instructive as they're actually covering the options realistically.
      • ceejayoz 2y ago
        Which way is "going the wrong way"?
• whatever1 2y ago
  The stable solution to this problem is infinite tariffs everywhere. But then these are politicians they will declare 2*infinity tariffs.
• Vivtek 2y ago
  Threaten people with a 49% national sales tax, and suddenly they celebrate when it's only 10%.
  • sampton 2y ago
    It also makes it easy for Chinese manufactures to circumvent tariffs. Completely pointless theater for the MAGA crowd.
    • jumpman_miya 2y ago
      [flagged]
    • some_random 2y ago
      How though? Obviously there will be tariff evasion but doing so at scale is impossible.
      • mwest217 2y ago
        Import to another country then the US?
      • seanmcdirmid 2y ago
        They setup more factories in vietnam to assemble chinese parts. But this isn't really a thing they can do in 90 days.
        • croes 2y ago
          You just need a address in Vietnam, who checks if the factory exists?
          • seanmcdirmid 2y ago
            Fraud is fraud no matter what. But I don't think Vietnam will risk America's ire if they help China cheat.
• ProfessorLayton 2y ago
  So we're all in for another ride like this in 3 months? How are businesses supposed to plan anything in this environment? As nice as this surge is, I'm more focused on upping my cash reserves and bracing myself for a recession.
  • guelo 2y ago
    Why cash when inflation is coming?
    • randunel 2y ago
      You need liquidity when recessions come. Less liquid assets go for lower than usual since cash is king during those times. But nobody can predict recessions.
    • ghaff 2y ago
      Cash often refers to Money Market funds and the interest they pay tends to track inflation. There are also ibonds but you can invest a fairly limited amount in them.
      • lotsofpulp 2y ago
        Money market funds haven’t tracked inflation for people living in higher prices areas for a long time. Maybe if you already owned your final house and didn’t need healthcare or education.
        • ghaff 2y ago
          I was getting 5% until recently which isn’t that far off of where inflation hit. Of course, as you say, some things are higher although a normal age retired person isn’t that exposed to them.
    • muzani 2y ago
      Cash can bleed slower than the others, especially if there's stagflation. Liquidity is nice too during uncertain times. Also nearly 100% tariffs on one of the biggest trading partners is unlikely to hold for very long. There's probably a lot of options because of that.
• thrance 2y ago
  [flagged]
  • whimsicalism 2y ago
    the lesson to be learned is we are all humans and should get rich together, not to lean further into tit-for-tat anti-globalization.
    • anigbrowl 2y ago
      [flagged]
      • whimsicalism 2y ago
        The thing about stupid policies that make us poorer is they are self-punishing. The same is true of unnecessary retaliation after a backdown.
    • adamrezich 2y ago
      The Prisoner's Dilemma is a very easy game for everyone to win at if everyone cooperates. Unfortunately, everyone doesn't want to cooperate. It's a good idea to recognize and internalize this, as it's quite inherent to human nature, and won't be going away during any of our lifetimes.
      • whimsicalism 2y ago
        It's not a prisoners dilemna because you also lose by defecting while everyone else is cooperating. The thing to recognize and internalize is that the world is a lot more win-win than our psychology has been evolved to recognize. Nationalism, realpolitik, xenophobia - all of these are ideologies that make you poorer and worse off, not giving you some secret insight into the truth of human nature.
        • adamrezich 2y ago
          Everyone else is not cooperating though. Just because you think nationalism, realpolitik, and xenophobia (and slave labor, for that matter!) are all bad things that one shouldn't partake in, doesn't mean the rest of the world feels the same way, such that they will extend you the same courtesy.
• masijo 2y ago
  So he's basically gaming the market with insider trading.
  • thrance 2y ago
    He literally did a pump and dump crypto scam on his first day in office. That he is a scam artist only motivated by personal wealth and power gain is obvious to any and all remaining sane individuals on this planet. Too bad the majority of American voters aren't.
    • esalman 2y ago
      He was doing similar stuff during his first term. It's just more blatant now.
  • CyberDildonics 2y ago
    Did you expect something else?
  • ta1243 2y ago
    Did you expect anything less? Remember when presidents used to put their family farm into a blind trust to avoid any accusation of impropriety?
  • cmrdporcupine 2y ago
    Great way to get money loving sycophants closer to you and subservient to you and to shut up potential powerful critics. If you want wealth, stay close to where the secret knowledge is.
  • outer_web 2y ago
    This is what immunity buys you.
• seydor 2y ago
  I wonder if the stock markets will learn to disregard the US president for the next 4 years
  • wtcactus 2y ago
    His actions have real consequences for all the economy, stock markets can't simply disregard him.
  • immibis 2y ago
    Serious question: what's with the wave of utterly stupid comments on HN? Is it yuppie college grads working in silicon valley startups who have always had a thick abstraction layer between them and the system that gives them their paycheck? Is it trolls? Is it lifelong diehard contrarians (the same thing as trolls really)? Is it something else?
    • seydor 2y ago
      you re asking a stupid comment for a serious answer, that's not very smart
      • immibis 2y ago
        Third parties can answer.
• steveBK123 2y ago
  He's turned the US stock market into the same model as China's - the entire up/down rests on the leaders words. Which makes them fairly uninvestable.
  • j_maffe 2y ago
    Idk Xi is much more consistent with the CCP than Trump is with anything.
    • netsharc 2y ago
      It's amazing what Trump's accomplished for the US, isn't it.. he's dragged the country so fast downhill that China is looking more and more the better business partner.
  • ronsor 2y ago
    This isn't a good example because a lot investors are (or were) looking at China recently.
    • abirch 2y ago
      You can look at China; however, if you invest in China you're assuming counterparty risk with Xi, as he can destroy any Chines company that he wants.
      • nonethewiser 2y ago
        You also cant actually legally own most Chinese stock. IE "internet" stocks. What you can buy is an instrument intended to track them. Its called a VIE. That Alibaba stock you have? No, its a share from a seperate company setup in the Cayman Islands which should track the Alibaba stock. They are circumventing a Chinese law that makes foreign investment in Chinese companies illegal. It's a bad idea to own these.
        • cbhl 2y ago
• byearthithatius 2y ago
  He said FAKE NEWS literally just a day ago.... This man cannot be trusted about anything
  • deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
• java-man 2y ago
  Announce tariffs, the buddies buy. Announce pause, the buddies sell. Someone just made a truckload of money.
  • readthenotes1 2y ago
    The stock market got almost down to reasonable values based on price to earning ratios. Nevertheless, it was still a good time to buy, and also a good time just to ignore it and go about your daily business.
  • tucnak 2y ago
    When you say "buddies" what you really mean is "banks", "hedge funds" and "people to whom it was obvious that announced tariffs were bonkers". If you had the foresight and market sense, you could have made money, too. But you were scared, sold low, and now when it came back up, you suddenly found yourself at a loss (or the so-called "unrealised profit") Don't blame the markets.
    • bmandale 2y ago
      Of course they were bonkers. You still had to know when the bottom was and when he was going to announce the reversal. Many people assumed he would keep it up for at least a week before pulling back. If he had the market would have pulled back even more. It's easy to time the market when you're from the future.
      • tucnak 2y ago
        Honestly, HN is obsessed with finance; it seems at times like it's all you think about. But when it comes to basic trades, suddennly it's all excuses and "easy to time the market when you are from the future". A lot of people made money today; no, they are not all Trump "buddies"
        • TheOtherHobbes 2y ago
          But Trump's buddies and hench creatures made sure zero-risk money. Which is absolutely catastrophic for all kinds of reasons.
• krona 2y ago
  Probably the bond market reaction caught the admin off-guard, possibly indicating a liquidity crisis. As usual, wont someone think of the overleveraged hedge fund managers?!
  • bmandale 2y ago
    if you think he wasn't going to do something like this from the start then I have a bridge to sell you
    • krona 2y ago
      Who's 'he'? Stephen Miran?
• HaZeust 2y ago
  The blatant market manipulation is what really kills me about this. Just 2 hours prior he posted on Truth Social that it's a "good time to buy". Nothing really matters anymore, and 90-day pause is already showing his cards that the same bear-bull market run is happening in July. It's just crazy to discredit the full faith and credit of the US Stock Market and dollar in such a brazen fashion. Not to mention, with increasing China's tariffs - he STILL hasn't made compelling domestic policy to bring manufacturers here, and has put the cart before the horse by punishing U.S. companies for doing offshoring, before giving them a chance to build domestically. He's only made the super-cheap offshoring approach more expensive (but not more expensive than domestic production). Post-tariff offshoring is STILL a lower expenditure than (A) the investment of domestic infrastructure, (B) the runway of cash it takes before becoming sustainable, and (C) the ongoing wages, maintenance, and taxes to continually maintain it.
  • InkCanon 2y ago
    I believe it's some bizarre ploy so his supporters will say, "You should listen to Trump!"
• xyst 2y ago
  [flagged]
  • lawn 2y ago
    Unfortunately, there's a number of folks that think otherwise and they're more than a fringe.
  • krapp 2y ago
    >Or is there a fringe number of folks that think otherwise? If about 30 million people count as a fringe number, yes.
  • propagandist 2y ago
    Illiteracy is common.
  • adamrezich 2y ago
    If social confirmation of your worldview is what you seek, you're certainly in the right place.
  • thuanao 2y ago
    Being an illiterate moron isn't fringe. It's quite commonplace. Educated and intelligent is fringe.
  • __MatrixMan__ 2y ago
    I think he's well aware that the reasons he is giving for his actions make no sense. That doesn't mean he doesn't have a plan, he's just lying about it. As for the actions themselves, they're pretty much his standard operating procedure: > I think I can get away with bullying these people, so I will When he talks about the existing agreements being unfair, he means that we have leverage that we're not using. The proposed tariffs are proportional to the trade deficit because the trade deficit is a reasonable proxy for how invested that country is in its economic relations with the US. You can extort more from somebody who is heavily invested, and less from somebody who is lightly invested. It's a classic protection racket, just on a sliding scale. He's trying to look ignorant because it's at least a better look than showing the malice that actually drives him.
• StormChaser_5 2y ago
  It's not like the tariffs are gone. It's still 10% for everyone but China. That only seems small in comparison to what was being proposed before. I wonder will EU and others wait out 90 days while negotiating or match the 10% in kind
  • shaky-carrousel 2y ago
    Hopefully EU will still go ahead with the tariffs. We should not be dancing at the tune of the mad king.
    • jopsen 2y ago
      Yes, but what's the rush here? The EU should do what does best: make things boring. If retaliatory tariffs is the way to go, maybe do it the boring way: considered bit by bit, no flashy announcement. Or just make a 10 year deal on LNG so Trump can say we're paying the US money every year.
      • delusional 2y ago
        That seems to be the current strategy, and I happen to appreciate it. I'm pretty mad a the US for fucking up the entire world right now, but I also realise that acting on that anger is a bad idea. I appreciate the EU having some long discussions while the emotions fade.
      • kalleboo 2y ago
        > The EU should do what does best: make things boring Exactly, the absolute best thing the EU could do right now is project stability
    • paulddraper 2y ago
      You think that's gonna be the best outcome? EU already had 10% tariffs on all US autos. (Though tbf most other things were near zero.)
  • MaxHoppersGhost 2y ago
• freetanga 2y ago
  The stock exchange and the tariffs are not the battleground. Asia started dropping US treasury bills. 30 year bills reached a max in decades Trump blinked. Edit: this was front and center in Financial Times, WSJ three hours ago. Now suddenly pushed back, exchange rally being front page news. People don’t understand how close to financial apocalypse we have been. Somebody in the WH scared the shit out of Trump.
  • cmrdporcupine 2y ago
    You will never convince any of his apologists that this is the case. His first round with Canada back in February, and MAGA insisted "he won" Then came back and tried the same thing again two months later. Same response from the Canadian side. Same slight backing off, reorganizing, but confusion, and nobody seems to actually know which tariffs apply and which do not. It sounds now like 10% for the whole world, but still 25% steel and aluminum and other tariffs on Canada, the US's biggest trading partner and customer? How insane is that? They're "flooding the zone" with confusion and chaos, and making money in the process. Anybody who wants to maintain power and influence and money has to get close to him, avoid criticizing him, and then they get the inside scoop. It's mafia level crap.
  • somanyphotons 2y ago
    Do you have a link or article title for reading about the dropping of tbills
    • disgruntledphd2 2y ago
      It was in the FT but they reported it as rumour.
    • embeng4096 2y ago
      From CNBC: https://www.cnbc.com/2025/04/09/us-treasury-yields-investors-weigh-new-reciprocal-tariffs-.html https://www.cnbc.com/2025/04/09/us-treasury-yields-investors... > "Perhaps even more alarmingly, U.S. Treasury markets are also experiencing an incredibly aggressive selloff..." > The largest holders of Treasurys are Japan, China and the U.K.,...
• xnx 2y ago
  So Trump destroyed the hard-earned 80-year history of the United States for strength and stability for what exactly?
  • deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  • thuanao 2y ago
    Because he can, and because "owning the libs" is the whole modus operandi of the Republican Party that put him there. Seems obvious to me that the reason Trump uses tariffs is simply because that's the only tool available to him to exert his power. Tariffs let him wave his dick around. Cutting taxes requires passing legislation. Raising other taxes requires passing legislation.
    • java-man 2y ago
      ... and because 75,000,000 voters approved it. I fear what's coming next.
      • deleted 2y ago
        [deleted]
    • HarHarVeryFunny 2y ago
      Could be (a bit) worse. Lyndon Johnson named his dick "jumbo", and on occasion would take it out in front of journalists etc.
      • __MatrixMan__ 2y ago
        Would that be worse? Compared to drastically increasing the number of people who are able to afford to put food on the table, that's downright whimsical.
  • __MatrixMan__ 2y ago
    I assume it was part of the deal he made to get elected: Take the US out of the game internationally, and you can be in charge of whatever's left over. Nothing else adequately describes his actions.
• fancyfredbot 2y ago
  Too late for everyone who spent massively on flying in stock ahead of the tariff deadline. Too late for those forced to sell financial assets in order to pay margin calls. Too late for those working on projects involving foreign manufacturers which have now been cancelled due to tariff uncertainty. Too late for those who lost sales while they figured out pricing. Too early for the people fundraising to build US manufacturing capabilities. What a mess.
  • skyyler 2y ago
    It's almost like the whole point is just to enable insider trading on a scale we've never seen before.
    • jstummbillig 2y ago
      Is there any reliable instrument to find out? This seems so obvious, given the only alternative option seems to be believing they are completely insane.
      • alabastervlog 2y ago
        The independent IGs installed after all Nixon's criming might be in a good position to check up on that. But he illegally (without required notice period and specific reason provided to Congress) fired them right at the beginning of his term.
      • HumblyTossed 2y ago
        I mean it's all right there out in the open. He fired anyone who could hold him accountable and now he is openly manipulating the markets.
      • layer8 2y ago
        The alternative you mention is more likely, given all we know. On the other hand, why not both.
      • pstuart 2y ago
        Ah, there's the rub. Even with a smoking gun there's no political will to do anything about it. > are completely insane More likely detached from reality, laser focused on personal gain, and punishing perceived enemies.
• xg15 2y ago
  Surprise cutscenes can be interesting in games, not so much in reality.
• thuanao 2y ago
  [flagged]
• insane_dreamer 2y ago
  So, it was all a bluff? (As many people suspected it would be.)
  • spacephysics 2y ago
    It brought a large number of countries to the negotiating table, and shows he’s willing to execute on threats of keeping tariffs high for an individual country. Now is the ripe time, 90 days, to make a deal with the US and offer the best terms. The whole point of Trump is to leverage uncertainty, make an unrealistically high water mark, then go down from there (to a point thats still very favorable) This rationale can explain many actions he’s taken. Is it reckless? Risky? For sure. Does it work? It has in the past, let’s hope it does for the global financial system, for everyone’s sake.
    • louthy 2y ago
      > It brought a large number of countries to the negotiating table Did it? They said it did, but I wouldn’t trust a word they say. What concessions has he actually got from the rest of the world? Was it worth it? It seems to me the two biggest trading ‘partners’ (China and EU) were escalating, not conceding.
      • arandomusername 2y ago
        Are you really doubting that countries wouldn't negotiate? Seriously? Multiple countries offered no tariffs, like Israel and Vietnam I think? EU offered 0/0 for cars/industrial. SK president said they will negotiate. > Was it worth it? Time will tell.
        • louthy 2y ago
          > Are you really doubting that countries wouldn't negotiate? Seriously? I doubt everything those charlatans say. They are liars and will say anything to maintain the illusion of competence.
        • const_cast 2y ago
• ntsl151 2y ago
  [flagged]
  • adamrezich 2y ago
    [flagged]
• yxhuvud 2y ago
  10% is still a lot. Counter tariffs will still happen.
  • MaxHoppersGhost 2y ago
    EU and many other counties have already had tariffs on the US for a long time.
    • knowaveragejoe 2y ago
      * EU and many other counties have had comparatively small and targeted tariffs on the US for a long time
      • IX-103 2y ago
        Just like the US has had small and targeted tariffs on the EU for a long time (such as pickup trucks).
    • acdha 2y ago
      You’ve been repeating that a lot but as many people have corrected you, they’re nothing like this broad or high: only 1%, and that’s balanced by the EU’s trade deficit on services since we don’t make things like good cars for Europe but they buy a lot of software, entertainment, etc. https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/qanda_25_541 https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/qanda_...
    • regularjack 2y ago
      On specific products
  • jollyllama 2y ago
    Would triggering counter tariffs be deflationary as net result will be less money coming into the US?
  • digianarchist 2y ago
    10% only applies to countries that have not retaliated. I assume (dangerous in these times) that any retaliation will cause reinstatement of the previous rates.
• mandeepj 2y ago
  With today's rollback, the glitz and glam event - Liberation Day - held last week, was not really a Liberation Day? :-)
  • BLKNSLVR 2y ago
    Does that make today Incarceration Day or Subjugation Day?
  • codedokode 2y ago
    Well it was a Day, not Liberation Month or Year.
• me2too 2y ago
  This man's absurdity never ceases to amaze me. How can his supporters appreciate all this - constant - chaos? Moreover, from the outside (European here), it looks like the US president can literally do whatever he wants without being subject to regulations or facing any consequences - pretty much like a dictatorship. No discussion, no parliament, no opposition taken into account. Crazy.
  • amanaplanacanal 2y ago
    Evidently Congress gave the presidency emergency powers to do what he wants with tariffs, all he has to do is declare an emergency. Just one more example of how Congress is completely broken.
    • me2too 2y ago
      He literally created the emergency himself. What the hell. I can't understand how one of the most powerful countries in the world doesn't have a system in place to prevent the president to act like a dictator
      • consp 2y ago
        > He literally created the emergency himself. Classic right wing playbook. Here they defunded immigration services and then called for a crisis because there was not enough space to put all asylum seekers and there was too great a backlog to get it all processed in time.
    • vel0city 2y ago
      That power is only supposed to last for some number of days before review by Congress. But Congress decided a day isn't a day anymore, at least for the rest of the year.
    • moogly 2y ago
      Did he even declare an emergency for the latest near world-wide tariffs? Are they even pretending anymore? If so I missed it.
• gmd63 2y ago
  So if you cozy up to the mad king, he'll tell you what he plans to do with appropriate notice. This is the least American tyrannical bullshit I've ever seen in this country, and nobody should be condoning it. The most important thing that can be done for the prosperity of America right now is to put an end to the senseless fraud and nonsensical policy promoted by the snake oil salesman of the MAGA movement.
• louthy 2y ago
  Trump has now shown his hand. Even with the tariffs on China remaining, it’s clear that Trump will back down on any extreme positions he takes. So, expect the china tariffs to be backed off soon too (once he gets some concession that he can brandish as a win). In 3 months, sell your positions, let him play his stupid games and re-buy once he backs down, because he will. Or just hold and ride it out. 10% sounds like where we’ll default to in the long-term because that was the ‘base rate’ for everybody anyway. He just wants to rattle his sabre, especially with China. It’s quite pathetic, really, but weirdly I feel slightly more calm about the situation now that I realise he hasn’t got the bottle to follow through.
  • trash_cat 2y ago
    > it’s clear that Trump will back down on any extreme positions he takes. That has always been the case with him. That's literally his negotiation tactic.
    • adamrezich 2y ago
      If only someone had written a book on this exact topic, back in the 80s.
    • louthy 2y ago
      I think that’s a fair comment. The only reason why I was not entirely convinced that that would be the case is that tariffs seem to be one of the positions that Trump was truly ideologically bound to. I couldn’t tell whether he would really go through with this or not. Now it’s clear he has no bottle at all. So weirdly is more of a comfort.
• jeffbee 2y ago
  SPX E-mini futures calls near the money doubled in the space of 1h. Everyone Trump tipped off potentially doubled their money with zero risk
• tmaly 2y ago
  If Trump is hoping to push the 10 year treasury rate down so he can roll the 9 trillion coming due in June, he is in for a wakeup. China is selling their holdings and driving the rates up. He is going to actually have to have a grownup negotiation with them rather than going scorched earth.
• refulgentis 2y ago
  Art of the deal. Thank you President Trump!
  • i80and 2y ago
    Gotta be careful -- Poe's Law is in full force rn in American Politics. People might read this seriously
• jurgenaut23 2y ago
  What a shit show...
• Huntsecker 2y ago
  The reality is that countries like spain have come out and said they need to move closer to China as USA is not a stable trading partner, within 24hrs of this Trump has back tracked, I'm sure MAGA will say this is all part of the mega master plan but at least to me its more the realisation this was turning into a car crash and he still has a window to somehow in trumps mind blame it all on the chinese
• K7mR2vZq 2y ago
  [flagged]
  • cAtte_ 2y ago
    [flagged]
  • lukev 2y ago
    [flagged]
• deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
• ck2 2y ago
  Congress could end this in 24 hours with a one paragraph/page bill and regardless who is in power next decade the dems should anyway It's like some blackhat is trying to find every loophole in government and exploiting it, like a fuzzer test
  • bluGill 2y ago
    The democrats has the president for 4 years, and plenty of power in congress. If they cared they would have done something.
  • jillesvangurp 2y ago
    Mid term elections are November next year. Some time between now and then, republican house and senator members will start getting more than a little bit anxious about not losing their seats. The current chaos is not great for their chances. The closer that election gets, the more likely it is that something like what you suggest might happen. The problem of course is that any move like that is going to result in chaos inside the republican party. I imagine that might delay the moment before e.g. Mike Johnson (speaker of the house) puts such a thing up for vote in the house. Because it sounds like that would be a career ending move for him. Until that changes, Trump can do as he pleases essentially unopposed.
• outer_web 2y ago
  Lot of whiplash with these tariff policies. I'm wondering if maybe it'd be a better idea to give* Congress this power instead.
  • SoyAnto 2y ago
    Congress does have the power (article I, section 8), however it delegated this power to the president for "extraordinary" situations with certain laws.
    • sitkack 2y ago
      > The nondelegation doctrine is rooted in certain separation of powers principles.1 In limiting Congress’s power to delegate, the *nondelegation doctrine exists primarily to prevent Congress from ceding its legislative power to other entities* not vested with legislative authority under the Constitution. As interpreted by the Court, the doctrine seeks to ensure that legislative decisions are made through a bicameral legislative process by the elected Members of Congress or governmental officials subject to constitutional accountability.2 Reserving the legislative power for a bicameral Congress was "intended to erect enduring checks on each Branch and to protect the people from the improvident exercise of power by mandating certain prescribed steps." https://constitution.congress.gov/browse/essay/artI-S1-5-1/ALDE_00000014/ https://constitution.congress.gov/browse/essay/artI-S1-5-1/A... Any democrats with working brain stems and genitals should be taking this to supreme court.
      • outer_web 2y ago
        Agreed however this court has shown it can dance between originalism, textualism, and tossing both of those to the wind (Trump v Anderson) when it aligns with policy goals. Also it probably wouldn't even fly with anyone since so many other emergency powers are generally accepted as necessary (i.e. defense). The immunity decision is full of rhetoric about the legislature being too slow for crises. Their best bet is to invent a time machine, go back to Obama, have Obama pass emergency tariffs, then lobby to repeal that act.
      • alabastervlog 2y ago
• nineplay 2y ago
  My takeaway from what I've read and heard in the last few weeks is that his only actual motivation is to 'win'. He bragged yesterday that other countries are kissing his ass to negotiate deals on the tariffs. I think that was all he wanted, I think he now thinks that this whole tariff thing was a success and he's going to move on to the next crazy idea. The rest of us suffer for it, except for the sad portion of the republican party who's only motivation is to own the libs and who now are congratulating themselves on how thoroughly the libs have been owned.
  • plaidfuji 2y ago
    Correct take. Any attempt to find a rational objective behind the tariffs is foolish.
  • TheBlight 2y ago
    [flagged]
    • shadowgovt 2y ago
      Pre-orders in a lot of businesses have been paused because with the tariffs volatile, stores can't guarantee they won't lose their shirts if they promise product to customers that is later unaffordable to sell (or cannot be sold at that agreed-upon pricepoint). China is also likely to continue selling off US treasuries; even if that wasn't an immediate way to disrupt the American economy by itself, it's a sound idea if their trust in the stability of the US as a sovereign nation has gone down. China is also, historically, the second-largest buyer and holder of US T-bills; if that changes, it will have consequences in terms of America's deficit.
    • rqtwteye 2y ago
      People who are retired and don’t have multi million portfolios are certainly suffering. I bet this will kill off a lot of small businesses
    • nineplay 2y ago
      Permanent damage has been done to our relationships with countries that have always been our allies. Permanent damage has to our economic markets, since everyone now knows that everything can change on the whim of a single man. Permanent damage has been done to any reputation we've had as a supporter of democracy worldwide now that we've abandoned our support of Ukraine. Permanent damage has been done to our own faith in our country. Any pride I had in our values and democracy has slipped away, now I know that they were all illusions.
• 4ndrewl 2y ago
  Pulling stunts like this just makes the USA even less investable. Markets operating at the whims of a capricious King (is there even a functioning government right now?)
  • the_arun 2y ago
    Without taking sides, what if we think this wasn't a stunt but a genuine experiment?
    • AlecSchueler 2y ago
      What's the difference?
    • __MatrixMan__ 2y ago
      What do you propose was learned from it that wasn't already known?
    • 4ndrewl 2y ago
      Or performance art
  • JKCalhoun 2y ago
    Yeah, pretty sure the markets will "re-adjust" from their good-news swoon when they realize nothing has really changed.
  • grandempire 2y ago
    Do you recommend any alternative markets to be more investable?
    • 4ndrewl 2y ago
      Somewhere with a predictable economic policy that doesn't flip flop from week-to-week.
      • grandempire 2y ago
• solardev 2y ago
  Wait, I thought true random numbers were hard to generate?
  • udev4096 2y ago
    Nothing is truly random. It's all just an illusion!
    • pikminguy 2y ago
      I'm pretty sure radioactive decay is truly random in the deepest possible sense.
      • foobarian 2y ago
        It could be a simulation
• misantroop 2y ago
  Insider trading, pure and simple. You can bet his son-in-law and all his buddies made hundreds of millions here. America is a 3rd world country, nothing else.
• deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
• thih9 2y ago
  Announce a controversial decision. See if it sticks. If not, claim it was a joke and you never meant that. Drama, manipulation, and a US government tactic, all in one.
  • dcow 2y ago
    Except they implemented the decision and are responding to countries’ willingness to negotiate fair trade terms, just like with Mexico. Nobody is saying “just joking”. If people weren’t 1000% dismissive of the leader’s stated intentions they might be able to follow along. It’s been crystal clear to me that the goal has always been to renegotiate trade terms not to live in a world with persistent reciprocal tariffs.
    • JeremyNT 2y ago
      This is a hilarious assertion. Their stated objectives have been all over the map, so any outcome can fit at least some of their statements. Admin proxies have said tariffs are to pay for tax cuts, they've stated they're intended to bring back manufacturing jobs, they've stated we should prepare for a lengthy trade war and accept the higher prices like men, and while some proxies have said this is a negotiation tactic others have stated unequivocally that this is not a negotiation tactic. Bold assertions like yours are easy to make with the benefit of hindsight. What do you predict tariff rates to be in a week? A month? A year?
    • davidguetta 2y ago
      Not sure why this is downvoted, this is absolutely the kind of power play Trump did his entire business career on.
      • thih9 2y ago
        It is also a dick move. You can get rich this way, but you can't get respect. The fact that half of a respected nation opted for this approach continues to baffle me. And maybe I should say "formerly respected nation", the global perception of the US goes rapidly down. I guess the question now is will the nation actually profit from that.
• robin_reala 2y ago
  The best way to stay clear from this insanity is to divest from the US as much as possible / reasonable. It won’t help second-order effects, but it reduces your exposure.
  • dachris 2y ago
    I wouldn't go that far (there's still the possibility that things change for the better for whatever reason), but those 60%-70% of the US in global stock indices really do look like single country risk now.
• tim333 2y ago
  Seldom a dull moment with the present government. He's still saying 125% on China so it's not back to normality. Also I guess the penguins still face 10%.
  • rchaud 2y ago
    Few dull moments in Mobutu's time in Zaire too I hear.
• jdlyga 2y ago
  Trump is like your father who overreacts to everything but changes his mind when he calms down. "You're grounded for a year!". 1 hour later. "Ok, you're not grounded. But you can't go out with your friend this weekend".
  • volkk 2y ago
    poor analogy since this implies that Trump has everyone's best interests in his heart
  • daxfohl 2y ago
    I'd liken him more to some rich kid trying to show off some made-up street cred by going over the top on everything. Eventually walking everything back while shouting dumb threats once he realizes he's in over his head. Then somehow he forgets it all and does the same dumb thing the next day. Every single time.
• usaar333 2y ago
  VIX is still at 35%. We are still in quite unstable territory, just not insanely unstable.
  • DavidPiper 2y ago
    I didn't know about VIX ("volatility index" I presume from a quick Google), thanks for posting this. Interesting(?) that the only two previous spikes higher than the current one are COVID and the 2008 GFC.
• compumike 2y ago
  Is it just the historical legacy of international trade that tariffs apply only to physical goods, but not to something like software-as-a-service subscriptions, digital media, or intellectual property? As the latter categories are more representative of US exports, it would surely be an interesting escalation if other countries were to start including them in their “retaliatory” tariffs.
  • benob 2y ago
    This is exactly what EU is discussing
    • Nemo_bis 2y ago
      Indeed. There are many options on the table. https://www.politico.eu/article/belgium-brussels-amazon-google-meta-ursula-von-der-leyen-tech/ https://www.politico.eu/article/belgium-brussels-amazon-goog... https://www.politico.eu/article/eu-trade-bazooka-anti-coercion-instrument-donald-trump-tariffs/ https://www.politico.eu/article/eu-trade-bazooka-anti-coerci... https://www.euractiv.com/section/tech/news/france-singles-out-digital-services-for-eus-tariff-response/ https://www.euractiv.com/section/tech/news/france-singles-ou...
  • davidguetta 2y ago
    I still wonder why this was not done instantly by EU. US has an imbalance on goods that was used to calculate the tariff amount, but it has the opposite imbalance on service from what I've read
    • kansface 2y ago
      The EU effectively backdoors tariffs against US software vendors via fines and the occasional if ineffective subsidy for local competitors in the local language.
      • piva00 2y ago
        No, fines are for breaking the law, if they don't break the law there's no way for the EU to collect the money. It's like speed traps, people can be mad at them because they broke the law and were caught, it doesn't alleviate the fact they could have just followed the rules.
• Animats 2y ago
  Possibly because lawsuits challenging the power of the President to impose tariffs under the Emergency Economic Powers Act are underway.[1] GOP support for Congress taking back control of tariffs is building.[2] At some point, Congress or the courts will take his toys away. [1] https://www.newsweek.com/trump-tariffs-hit-lawsuit-group-his-supreme-court-adviser-funded-2056761 https://www.newsweek.com/trump-tariffs-hit-lawsuit-group-his... [2] https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/5236142-congress-tariff-bill-trump/ https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/5236142-congress-tariff-...
  • hello_computer 2y ago
    Seems kinda crazy that so much power was ever vested in the president. https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/R48435 https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/R48435
    • eftychis 2y ago
      Laziness and fear of the closet monster beget tyrants.
      • enaaem 2y ago
        The best way to sabotage Trump is doing exactly what he wants (and make sure he takes all the credit).
        • etiam 2y ago
          How would you manage the bit in parenthesis? It's a foundational part of the sickness in people like Trump that anything bad is by definition somebody else's fault, and clearly his cultists just keep lapping up his lies no matter how insane and transparent.
          • hn_acc1 2y ago
            This. Anything (accidentally) good was totally intended by Trump. Anything bad was because of evil ultra-leftists sabotaging his intended good, and not because Trump made even the tiniest of mistakes.
• deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
• pera 2y ago
  - April 7th: Spread rumours of a 90 days tariff pause which immediately triggers a market really, then claim it was "fake new", markets go down - April 9th: "THIS IS A GREAT TIME TO BUY!!! DJT", then 4 hours later announce a 90 days tariff reduction, markets jump nearly 10% This level of market manipulation orchestrated directly by a head of state is something you only see in totalitarian states. The US is moving into a very serious situation. These people won't ever voluntarily leave the Oval Office.
  • stellalo 2y ago
    Luckily the founding fathers thought of this
    • skyyler 2y ago
      If you're referring to 2A then I suggest you start building anti-aircraft weapons in your militias five years ago.
      • 8note 2y ago
        which is what, drone swarms to kill the jet engines? flying them that high has got to be a pain
    • sirbutters 2y ago
      Did you forget "/s"?
      • goatlover 2y ago
        There is a famous quote from Thomas Jefferson about watering the tree of liberty.
  • mateus1 2y ago
    It's direct wealth transfer to his supporters, paid by opponents and people who can't play the market...
  • 2y ago
• hello_computer 2y ago
  It's Elon's dogecoin pump & dump all over again. I should have kept an eye on twitter!
• ryzvonusef 2y ago
  On the one hand, this entire exercise has been (and continues to be) batship insane ....Otoh this is good in a meta sense, tells about the level of resilience of the capitalist system, I think we should treat this entire fiasco as one of those controlled forest fire sort of things. Like...anytime someone tries to mention JIT or other corporate 'efficiency' nonsense, we can refer to these sort of shenanigans and shut them down.
• 9283409232 2y ago
  I wouldn't call it the lede but also in this article is that he increased China tariffs to 125% which is funny. Let's just keep it going, 200% China tariffs! Why not? People weren't going to do business at the 54% tariff anyway.
• mrlonglong 2y ago
  [flagged]
  • dcow 2y ago
    That’s a term of endearment if you ask all your exiled prisoners.
  • dang 2y ago
    I appreciate the art and craft of UK swearing as much as anyone, but please don't post flamewar comments here, especially not denunciatory ones on divisive topics. It just makes the threads worse. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
  • deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
• glitchc 2y ago
  Trump is using fuzzing to find weaknesses in global trade. He's basically a security researcher at this point.
  • neogodless 2y ago
    Time to delete the production database to test our disaster recovery plan!
    • glitchc 2y ago
      Fail early, fail often.
• wickedOne 2y ago
  i wonder why the rest of the world doesn't just come together for a while and stop trading / providing raw materials to the u.s. for let's say a year or so. isn't this all just a huge pile of bluff poker?
  • tim333 2y ago
    A lot of people have jobs dependent on business as usual. You don't want to just fire the workers for a year.
    • wickedOne 2y ago
      the u.s. is not the only country other countries trade with so firing people should not have to be the result as long as you divert?
  • paulddraper 2y ago
    > stop trading to the u.s. That makes as much sense as a hunger strike over food rations.
    • wickedOne 2y ago
      because the u.s. is the only country the rest of the world can trade with?
  • arandomusername 2y ago
    Because their economies would suffer heavily? That's why they are upset about the tariffs in the first place.
  • uwagar 2y ago
    this is what BRICS floated trying to remove the USD as reserve currency. now they gone all quiet when trump threatened 100% tariffs. plus remember trump could threaten nuclear attack on the ringleader.
    • 2y ago
• mppm 2y ago
  The stock market today seriously reeks of insider trading. Most stocks were down pre-market, but suddenly went up at 9:30 when the big boys joined the trading. And that right after the announcement of further escalation with China. I was really wondering about that, but it seems clear in retrospect that some people were ahead of the curve by a few hours.
  • maronato 2y ago
    Trump posted on social media this morning that it was a great time to buy. A couple of days ago, he said people should be buying low and that it was a great time to get rich. I’m convinced this was his plan all along, and his friends were all in it.
• picafrost 2y ago
  Very sad to see what is happening to the US. Sadder still to see it celebrated and defended by a large portion of the country. From over here in Europe, the apparent lack of accountability in the US right now is unbelievable. Where are the adults?
  • TheOtherHobbes 2y ago
    The supposed adults are making bank. The political subtext is "Follow me and I will make you extremely rich." Congress, the Senate, and the Supreme Court won't touch him after this.
  • m0llusk 2y ago
    It is sad that opposition is not being acknowledged. There was a determined effort to restore Canada's tariffs to what they were that passed the Senate and was then blocked by an unusual maneuver from the speaker of the house which in turn got him excoriated by some Republicans in congress. Some of the biggest conservative power players and possibly the most famous and successful conservative lawyers are teaming up to challenge emergency executive tariff powers in court. Meanwhile US citizens retain high confidence in elections and Republicans nationwide are complaining in a panic that these moves will turn their precincts Democratic for decades. But of course you are totally right. No adults anywhere. Keep thinking that Europe can count on others to pay for its defense while buying all the energy they need from Moscow. At least you have adults in the room, right?
  • arandomusername 2y ago
    I'm from Europe. You should be focusing those questions on EU, we have much bigger problems. Mass immigration has decimated Europe.
    • louthy 2y ago
      It hasn’t. Europe is still functioning perfectly well. Let’s not start echoing far right talking points. Immigration is a topic that should be approached with measured language. Terms like ‘decimated’ is not helpful.
• magicloop 2y ago
  "It’s the T-bills wot dun it." That’s my read on why the U.S. just paused the global tariff hike to 10%. From the beginning, I’ve believed the executive branch's real goal was to push down the yield on the 10-year Treasury. Why? Because Uncle Sam has to refinance a mountain of debt this year, and the cost of that depends heavily on Treasury yields — especially the 10-year. That’s the rate that sets the tone for everything from mortgages to corporate borrowing. So they tried to spook markets. Introduce global tariffs. Stir up uncertainty. And it worked—at first. Yields dipped. Traders moved to Treasuries as a typical flight-to-safety. But then something flipped. Instead of being seen as a safe haven, U.S. debt itself started to look shaky. Maybe it was the deficit outlook, maybe the global response to tariffs — but whatever it was, yields started climbing. Fast. At that point, the strategy backfired. The executive branch had no choice but to walk it back. So they paused the tariffs. Because when your national budget depends on cheap debt, you can't afford a crisis of confidence in your bonds.
  • jddj 2y ago
    Yeah, the bond market started saying firmly "stop fucking around" and an adult seemingly appeared in the room
    • pixelpoet 2y ago
      I realise I'm asking for an imagined scenario but- who would this adult be, that somehow escaped the purge of competence and oversight in favour of sycophants, and how would they broach the topic with Trump (who of course wants to be the Big Boy and loves supplication)?
  • thfuran 2y ago
    That doesn't pass muster. If they had much interest in balancing the books, they wouldn't be ripping huge holes in revenue collection.
    • throwaway48476 2y ago
      If they wanted to balance the books they'd print money and distribute it to US citizens.
• udev4096 2y ago
  Oh boy, HFTs made a fuck ton of money in the last few days. Probably as much as they make in a year even
  • snarf21 2y ago
    Maybe, just maybe, this is all about a secret wealth transfer.
    • anonzzzies 2y ago
      Yeah, Trump basically told before he announced the pause. I made a lot of money in the past week doing very little but pay close attention to this flaky dude.
    • mfitton 2y ago
      Do you think normal people (think, your average investing American) are trading based on this news? They probably shouldn't be... I would think that by far most of the trading these past few days has been institutions, so, a big transfer from some financial institutions to others?
      • delusional 2y ago
        Aren't your 401k's tied up in stocks and bonds? Index funds too will probably have been fleeced too on the volatility.
        • kcb 2y ago
          But surely you didn't sell off your 401k.
          • stubish 2y ago
            Managed funds and ETFs will have needed to rebalance, buying and selling assets to get the proportions back to what they are supposed to be.
      • 2y ago
• ein0p 2y ago
  Art of the deal. 10% seems "reasonable" to everyone now. That was not the case a week ago. Meanwhile a bunch of overleveraged stock market buffoons were taken to the cleaners.
  • rsynnott 2y ago
    10% doesn't seem reasonable to anyone. Note that markets are still drastically down.
• dcow 2y ago
  I don’t get the outrage. Trump did this with Mexico. He imposed tariffs and then immediately eased them when Mexico started negotiating. It worked. Wouldn’t a rational market understand his behavior by now (not agree with it, but understand it). Especially since his stated goal has been “impose tariffs to spur renegotiation of trade terms”. Why would a rational market actor be acting like Trump isn’t doing what he’s said he’s doing?
  • amanaplanacanal 2y ago
    Sure. Trump is trying to renegotiate the trade deals with Mexico and Canada that he himself negotiated during his last term, by unilaterally imposing massive tariffs. Why are you pretending that this makes any sense?
• thomyor 2y ago
  [dead]
• zombiwoof 2y ago
  So much stability
• zombiwoof 2y ago
  Pretty clear Trump shorted the market, now going pump and dump
• mmphosis 2y ago
  Brawndo's got what plants crave. It's got electrolytes — Idiocracy [movie]
• macspoofing 2y ago
  Chaos agent. It's great to go through this every month.
  • BLKNSLVR 2y ago
    Month? Day at best, hour at worst.
• robofanatic 2y ago
  I almost bought some bluechip stocks yesterday but changed my mind thinking it may dip further. But my luck is such that it would have actually dipped if I had bought. With my luck these days no matter what I choose, I lose. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
  • rectang 2y ago
    If it was that easy to "catch a falling knife", everyone would do it.
• Kwpolska 2y ago
  > “This was his strategy all along,” Bessent said at the White House, where officials, including him, had denied for days that the tariffs would be suspended. And why should we believe them? If it was the strategy, you could have made the tariff announcement into an acrostic or something.
  • RevEng 2y ago
    Not 24 hours ago he said the tariffs were non negotiable, now he says this was always the plan. There's no reason to believe a word he says.
  • csense 2y ago
    Hypothetically, assume for the moment Bessent is telling the truth. Now let's try to pencil in what the administration's reasoning might be. Here's my best guess at how the conversation in the White House went: Advisor A: So we're all agreed then. 10% tariffs across the board is our strategy, except China, because Xi is a special boy. Advisor B: If we announce that, everyone will freak out. There will be rage and panic. Advisor A: That's where the tactics come in. We announce greater tariffs first, according to this super sketchy formula my intern cooked up with ChatGPT. Advisor C: That's not what we agreed! Advisor B: How will that stop the rage and panic? Advisor A: It's tactics not strategy. We walk it back just before it hits. People will be too busy being relieved to be raged and panicked about 10%. We get the policy we want; the people / markets / etc. will only freak out for a few days and then go back to normal. Trump: I like it. (Opens Resolute desk drawer.) Here's a signed copy of the Art of the Deal. Advisor A: Thank you sir! I will cherish it for the rest of my days. Again, the above is my guess as to what happened, under the (perhaps questionable) assumption that Bessent is telling the truth. ("How likely is this assumption?" is a question orthogonal to the point I'm trying to make, and therefore, out-of-scope for this post.)
• sixstringninja 2y ago
  This is a money grab. Someone or a bunch made a lot of money
• layer8 2y ago
  The 10% apparently also apply to Canada and Mexico now, which they didn’t before: > In a strange turn of events, the president seems to have added another 10 percent tariff to Canada and Mexico. Asked earlier if the 10 percent tariff extended to those countries, Scott Bessent, the Treasury secretary, said that it did. And a White House official clarified for me just now that that was the case. Previously, Canada and Mexico had been exempted from this round of “reciprocal” tariffs, though they still faced a 25 percent tariff that the president imposed last month on many of their goods. https://www.nytimes.com/live/2025/04/08/business/trump-tariffs-stock-market/df467314-c135-5297-bb7d-f23f99b1ca79 https://www.nytimes.com/live/2025/04/08/business/trump-tarif...
  • matt-p 2y ago
    Also china has 125% tarriff but the reason that they couldn't originally give 10% to Vietnam was trans-shipment of Chinese goods. If it wasn't happening before, it certainly will be now. What's actually wrong with them.
    • alpha_squared 2y ago
      I'm coming to the conclusion that the tariffs are a distraction. The 10% across the board appears more like a tax hike without calling it one while the focus on China is just the same old trade war from the first term with louder chest-beating.
      • Spivak 2y ago
        But a distraction from what? There doesn't seem to be any kind of obvious other thing they're trying to do with the cover. They're not exactly being secretive with ICE arrests, the mass layoffs from the federal government, or their weird campaign against DEI that the administration seems to have all but forgotten about.
        • tpurves 2y ago
          They literally have no idea what they doing from one moment to the next. Obviously they are making up facts and strategies on the fly maybe minutes before press conferences. Just look all the math errors, irrational formulas and tariffing penguins. The malevolent incompetence is staggering.
• cbmask 2y ago
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• foogazi 2y ago
  If the country gets rich from tariffs why stop them?
  • rvnx 2y ago
    This is where I don't follow Trump's logic. Trump and Musk were claiming that the US will push super high tariffs, that it will make the US rich, and hinting that it will maybe even be possible to suppress the income tax.
    • partiallypro 2y ago
      Musk to his credit is pretty anti-tariff, and has touted a 0% tariff environment with Europe. It's Navarro and Lutnick that are the devil's whispering into his ear on this policy.
  • RevEng 2y ago
    Because it's not the country getting rich - it's the government getting rich from its citizens. It's another form of taxation, but one with no plan and crazy fluctuations day to day that affect first and foremost businesses, who will put off investments are start layoffs in order to make themselves more resilient to the chaos, which affects the whole economy. And this long term downturn in the economy doesn't make the country rich, but rather poor. If what Trump was saying about making the country rich were true, then sure, why would people complain? But it's not true; just a lie told to placate his followers. It's another version of "diamond hands" or "ride the dip" that you hear from people pumping and dumping crypto stocks.
• karim79 2y ago
  Is anyone sure this is not stock manipulation? Honest question.
  • misantroop 2y ago
    This is pure manipulation. It was engineered to just that from the start. Since it's America, no investigation will be done to look into who profited here - possibly billions off regular people who had margin calls. 3rd world country.
    • stouset 2y ago
      > billions off regular people who had margin calls Thanks, Robinhood!
      • 2OEH8eoCRo0 2y ago
        I like the ironic name. Robinhood is where the poor go to send their money to the rich.
    • lotsofpulp 2y ago
      > possibly billions off regular people who had margin calls. Regular people have no business gambling with levered bets on publicly traded equities. Those losses are their own fault, and they should sell gambling treatment.
  • mort96 2y ago
    The president told his Truth Social followers that it's a great time to buy stock just a few hours before this announcement: https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/114308272725981913 https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/1143082727259... It's probably many things, but one part of it is for sure stock manipulation.
    • etcet 2y ago
      This is wild. 8:37AM "THIS IS A GREAT TIME TO BUY!!! DJT" 12:18PM "I have authorized a 90 day PAUSE, and a substantially lowered Reciprocal Tariff during this period, of 10%, also effective immediately. Thank you for your attention to this matter!"
• PeakKS 2y ago
  Up and down and up again. The entire US economy is being used as a pump & dump scam.
  • chasing 2y ago
    Yup. The next 3.75 years are going to suck. Thank you, GOP, for completely shirking your responsibility to keep this kind of garbage in check.
• jmward01 2y ago
  Why does the market like this? Tariffs are in place and unpredictability is now the norm. Tomorrow something new crazy will come out and then the next day and the next day. Even if US markets like this right now, the long term damage has been done. Betting on the medium-long term seems questionable at best.
  • ohgr 2y ago
    The market doesn't like this. All the professional investors got out ages ago (check out Berkshire's dumping) and are dumping to bagholders. Large fund holders are hanging on because they still make fees and it keeps their AUM up there and everyone else is dying at the same rate. Foreign investors are pulling bonds out because the currency is at risk. The market is being manipulated daily and there is no involvement from SEC. There is only risk left. Confidence is gone. It is the textbook definition of a fucking shit show.
    • cmrdporcupine 2y ago
      You're making me feel better about missing the bump today. I got out over a week ago before things went completely bonkers. Was planning on getting back in when I had a sense the volatility had diminished. Came back from a meeting to find things were halfway back to where I sold and started to feel bummed. Guess we'll see what tomorrow brings.
      • ohgr 2y ago
        Never feel bad for what you didn’t make.
  • TrackerFF 2y ago
    Dead cat bounce.
  • colechristensen 2y ago
    The market doesn't know anything, the people who are trading are trading on FOMO and sentiment, because valuation is completely unpredictable when the global economy is being dictated by one man.
• BuckRogers 2y ago
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      • fancyfredbot 2y ago
        You said Trump sided with the working man and against Wall Street. Which is really cute because actually thousands of auto workers have been put on leave [1] whereas the market volatility is expected to drive bumper profits for banks [2]. I am starting to doubt you are being serious but if you aren't then I'm humbled by the quality of the satire. [1] https://edition.cnn.com/2025/04/03/business/tariff-related-layoffs-hit-five-us-auto-plants/index.html https://edition.cnn.com/2025/04/03/business/tariff-related-l... [2] https://www.thebanker.com/content/250b43e2-67e2-46ba-93ea-8a2e2ee49900 https://www.thebanker.com/content/250b43e2-67e2-46ba-93ea-8a...
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• christkv 2y ago
  It will be very interesting to see what deals are made in the next 90 days. There is a lot of speculation that the US will push to isolate China as part of any deals made. Who knows.
• Vegenoid 2y ago
  Shaking the economy like a snowglobe is sure to make businesses conservative and fearful of spending. There is no path to this being a good thing for the United States.
• misantroop 2y ago
  So much different analysis for something as simple as insider trading. Remember, Trump always said stock market performance was everything. Then this week suddenly, stock market doesn't matter. In retrospect, it's all so obvious. Neither me nor anyone else could expect them to be so bold about it.
• jeswin 2y ago
  Contrarian opinion. Irrespective of what you think of Trump, decentralization of production capacity is a good thing — maybe even essential. If this continued for, say, another twenty years, the West and the rest of the world would be completely stripped of all ability to defend themselves. Literally everything from picket fences to rolling stock to tableware is coming from one country.
  • Swenrekcah 2y ago
    This is not a contrarian opinion. This is a problem that was recognized long ago and production capacity for strategically important industries has been in the buildup both in Europe and the US. Trump's actions will probably boost European, Canadian and Australian industries a bit more now. Investment in the US will be a hard sell for companies that care about the stability and level-headedness of governments where they operate.
    • jeswin 2y ago
      Well, the contrarian opinion is that this (whatever he did) is a good thing - whether decentralisation happens into the US, Europe or wherever. It's one thing to recognise the problem, and another to attempt to change an uncomfortable status quo. Every other approach attempted to date has been milder, and hasn't worked. But we'll see if he sticks to it.
      • Swenrekcah 2y ago
        > Every other approach attempted to date has been milder, and hasn't worked. A lot of things were working even if they did not change everything overnight. And the changes that will come to the world order and industries following this administration will on the whole be detrimental for the US economy and position in the world.
        • jeswin 2y ago
          There are two parts to what you said. > A lot of things were working even if they did not change everything overnight. We can disagree. The frog was slowly getting cooked. China's trade surplus has reached 1 Trillion dollars, and has seen consistent YoY growth for decades. Such asymmetry is dangerous in the long run. Now, none of this is China's fault. They did the right thing for their country and their population. > And the changes that will come to the world order and industries following this administration will on the whole be detrimental for the US economy and position in the world. That remains to be seen. I have no way of knowing, but I would assume that it isn't just the US which is concerned about this.
• nemo44x 2y ago
  Genius move. Set the trap (massive global tariffs that seem irrational) and wait for target (china) to retaliate. Once the bait is taken, alienate china and take the pressure off everyone else. New reality still departure from previous order but feels better and gives everyone 90 days to figure it out. Meanwhile china is trapped and isolated.
  • bloqs 2y ago
    Why not just skip everyone else to start with
    • nemo44x 2y ago
      1) USA looks far weaker when everyone is included initially. Emboldens china. Then it’s flipped once they commit. 2) Still have a smaller tariff in place but it doesn’t feel as shocking.
• wtcactus 2y ago
  [flagged]
  • seanmcdirmid 2y ago
    There were a lot of smart things that could be done "about China" and then there are a lot of dumb things...we chose the dumb things. We could...oh...increase are R&D on automation, AI, green energy, electric vehicles dramatically, we could focus on better education and better infrastructure for our cities (like lightrail in Seattle to where I live that doesn't take $200 billion and 2 decades to build). We could have just fought China with a better product. We could lean into our chip advantage that will only last at most a decade anyways. And many of those fit in with Conservative philosophy even (who doesn't want less regulation and cheaper/quicker construction, well, at least moderates like me would). But no, we doubled down on culture wars and going back in time to when America was more self sufficient but less rich.
  • 8note 2y ago
    something drastic to do what about china? i dont want china to be some colony of the west. i want china to become as rich as the west so that they can have clean domestic consumption with strong worker protections and rights
• nottorp 2y ago
  But can you trust him to keep them at 10% for more than 12 hours?
• shmerl 2y ago
  What a clown. Luddite level of policy making, inspired by "Ron Vara" aka Peter Navarro, who in a Kafkian fashion quoted himself as a backing for his lunatic theories.
• yibg 2y ago
  With the whiplash of tariffs, upping tariffs, pausing tariffs, I don't know how companies can do any planning. A lot of earnings are coming out next couple of weeks. Take Apple for example, how would they forecast Q2 numbers? They have 125% tariffs on all imports from China. Maybe it'll go up more as China increases their own. Or maybe it gets paused. I feel for the FP&A team there.
  • colechristensen 2y ago
    >I don't know how companies can do any planning. They can't. They're saying it out loud updating their guidance. In polite terms, on earnings calls you're going to hear "we don't know what the fuck to predict". Follow Bloomberg and you'll hear bank CEOs saying the same thing about the markets, they have no idea what to predict or how to price anything. Right now the line is that America looks like an emerging market with unpredictable wild swings based on policy changes. That is going to drive everyone away from the US, industries, customers, and trade partners.
  • kumarvvr 2y ago
    Its possible they will learn to live with the ebb and tide and ride along. What else can you do? Apple is perhaps already hiring a fleet of planes and ships to transport iPhones from all over the world to the US.
  • Tepix 2y ago
    No, apple only has 125% tariffs on imports from China to the US. They can send them elsewhere (or parts) and send India-made devices to the US instead for example.
• meinersbur 2y ago
  Does someone know how companies handle these short-term changes of tariffs? Like, when your shipment from oversees eventually arrives, a 50% tariff is due that makes your entire accounting unprofitable, e.g. a contract with another party to sell it to might already been signed. Do the companies usually ensure against these kind of things?
  • tossandthrow 2y ago
    I think this is risk og doing business. I can, as shown, also go the other way, where tarrifs are removed under shipments. Regardless, the core is exactly that people don't send things overseas in this environment.
• thund 2y ago
  Before announcing it he suggested to buy stocks, ie insider trading.
• etchalon 2y ago
  The dumbest possible timeline.
• arunabha 2y ago
  I am beginning to wonder if there is an actual plan behind these moves beyond creating uncertainty in trading partner's minds. The stated goal of the administration is to 'reindustrialize' the US by manufacturing more of the goods consumed within the US itself. To get to that goal, tariff barriers are just one part of the story. For tariffs to be effective towards getting to the strategic goal, they need to be coupled with sound industrial policy and a long term execution framework. The three legs of the stool, so to say. So far, there has been no mention of the other two legs. There is currently no serious bill proposed that aims to apply the required industrial policy and all of these tariffs being imposed under executive orders mean that instability in tariff rates and application is pretty much guaranteed. The very opposite of the stable, long term approach that is needed. Without the other parts, there is a very high chance that the US will bear the brunt of the short term damage, but with none of the long term benefits.
  • saulpw 2y ago
    I'm sorry, but only in April of 2025 you are wondering if there is an actual plan? Were you paying any attention at all from 2016-2020?
    • dmazin 2y ago
      I mean, Peter Navarro's tariff plan is a plan. It's just an absurdly fringe/incompetent plan.
  • mizzao 2y ago
    How about facilitating a monster load of insider trading?
    • chneu 2y ago
      At this point I don't see how anyone can look at what they're doing and not smell insider trader/pump and dump. It's super obvious.
      • pixxel 2y ago
• ipaddr 2y ago
  The issue is timing. He needed to paydown debt before imposing tariffs which will lower bond demand raising interest rates. You can't inshore industries from everyone and rely foreign debt to prop up the dollar.
• deleted 2y ago
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• wonderwonder 2y ago
  I voted for Trump and I would again in a heartbeat if faced with the same options but this has been dumb. Whole of the Right is running around screaming the "Art of the deal" when literally nothing has been accomplished. Market is still down, bond rates are still high. We trashed relationships with other countries and not a single trade deal has been signed. And he clearly backed down. We still have no idea what the end goal is. Its just dumb. We are objectively worse off than we were a week ago. He is still delivering for me on the reasons I voted for him but this chapter has been a debacle. Fun part is with Trump as president every week is a chapter, for most presidents a chapter is 2 years. So excited to see what's next. If he delivers on China and effectively resets the world financial and trade picture in our favor then well done but so far not impressed. Whole world celebrating the guy who started the fire putting it out. "Lisan Al Gaib" JFC
• TheAlchemist 2y ago
  What's quite impressive, is that people are so relieved now. The base scenario must have been really bad. As it is, we get: - 10% of tarrifs on everybody, 25% on several big sectors, 125% on China. Which is absolutely massive - any confidence in the sanity of the government absolutely destroyed - 90 days ? He can change his mind tomorrow, or in 90 days. Entirely possible that he forgets this whole thing during the 90 days. How is the tough negotiation with Russia going btw ? - China that showed it's not afraid of Trump. Trump fired all the bullets he had on China, he can increase the tarrifs to 1000%, it doesn't change a thing. Other than convincing other countries to openly joint US trade war on China, or use of military force, he cannot do anything more I believe. China on the other hand can wreck havock in many, many different ways. Just look at the bond markets yesterday - nobody knows if it was China or not. But everybody knows China could make it much worse. Same goes for US businesses. Safety inspection in Tesla or Apple suppliers factory ? Why not.
  • EasyMark 2y ago
    I don't mind the China tariffs. They have been abusing US interests for years and scoffed at promises they made when they entered into WTO and any IP is fair game for their corporate spies, and US companies would be laughed at to try and litigate any of it inside their borders. Something does need to happen with China, but the vast majority of Trump's tariffs were indeed as if he is stupid as a sack of rocks.
• nicholas1314 2y ago
  Does Trump seem to be using the country's credit to make money?
• mikewarot 2y ago
  The "Global Reserve Currency" privilege of the US dollar has been blown into bits, it's all a matter of time until our standards of living here in the US get cut by 75%.
• humanlity 2y ago
  In China, we called this battle as hypoglycemia (China) versus hypertension (USA), but, what do all the grand narratives have to do with me, I just want to live a good life. fxxk xi, fxxk trump
• humanlity 2y ago
  In China, we called this battle as hypoglycemia (China) versus hypertension (USA), but, what do all the grand narratives have to do with me, I just want to live a good life. fxxk Xi, fxxk Trump,
• trymas 2y ago
  Happy ~liberation~ market manipulation day!
• Havoc 2y ago
  There is zero chance that dude can sit on his hands for 90 days. He'll have some insane idea to replace it by end of week
  • Havoc 2y ago
    lol. More China tariffs. Didn’t even make it 24 hours
• SuperSandro2000 2y ago
  the chaos goes on
• Nemrod67 2y ago
  90% of stocks are owned by 10% of the population... Are you guys crying for the rich?
• fifilura 2y ago
  One thing that makes me curious. Pennsylvania unemployment rate is 3,4%. In the EU you commonly see unemployment rates around 10% and that is even after rather massive reeducation programs. Why is this seen as such a big problem that these 3,4% pretty much get to decide the entire US policy? In the EU that would be a great number and mostly normal considering that people that switch jobs or just finished studying or are just generally unemployable is counted towards that numer. https://www.pa.gov/agencies/dli/newsroom/pennsylvania-s-unemployment-rate-remains-at-3-4--in-august.html https://www.pa.gov/agencies/dli/newsroom/pennsylvania-s-unem...
  • saturn8601 2y ago
    You sure its just the 3.4%? 5% is considered 'full employment' so 3.4 should be some of the best times in history. How many people are employed but are in a job that barely provides enough money to survive? How many people are working 2 or even 3 jobs just to barely survive? Those people would be counted as 'employed'. You should look at these other groups of people before making judgement.
    • fifilura 2y ago
      I don't make judgement. I just read the link, and the source seemed reputable. But all I hear is "we want factory work back to Pennsylvania". If the jobs pay too low, why would you want even more low paying jobs back to USA, sewing t-shirts, making sneakers, working in a factory? And - specifically - why do the people that want that get so much influence?
    • alain94040 2y ago
      There are several different definitions of unemployment rates: U-3, U-6, etc. Are you sure you are comparing using the same definition? See for instance https://www.investopedia.com/articles/investing/080415/true-unemployment-rate-u6-vs-u3.asp https://www.investopedia.com/articles/investing/080415/true-...
• amai 2y ago
  And tariffs for Russia are still 0% ?
• enaaem 2y ago
  Same guy recommending what the US should do: https://bsky.app/profile/dieworkwear.bsky.social/post/3lmb6yeo7a22w https://bsky.app/profile/dieworkwear.bsky.social/post/3lmb6y... In short he argues that there is no point in making $50 chinos. Similarly to Italy, the US should focus on regional branding and high-end artisanal products. I would argue that ship has sailed under Trump. The US was in a prime position to brand itself via soft power and the media, and now it's actively being boycotted.
• mik09 2y ago
  'coming again to save the motherfucking day yeah!'