Tag Archives: US trade policy

Actions by the Trump administration may well represent a ‘regime shift’ in terms of US tariff rates.Perhaps the main regime shift that has occurred during the Trump presidency is in US trade policy. More than tax policy, this is an area where Trump could mark the clearest break – although economic historians often point out that the US economy’s rise to global dominance in the 19th century owed a lot to protectionism.Still, the trend since World War 2, and even more since the end of the Cold...

Meetings on Capitol Hill in mid-May with a series of top (mostly Republican) officials, congressmen and economic advisors provided insight into where the Trump presidency is going, trade tensions and the November mid-term election .*With apologies to Frank Capra.Christophe Donay, Head of Asset Allocation & Macroeconomic Research, Pictet Wealth Management.Meetings  I had in Washington in May touched on four main themes: i) economic policy; ii) trade policy; iii) US politics; and iv)...

US trade policy's attention is now turning towards China, with a threat of new tariffs. But we see here a lot of political rhetoric.After the tariffs on steel and aluminium, the Trump Administration’s attention now seems to be focused on China as the US’s merchandise trade deficit with China rose to a new high of USD 375bn in 2017. The trade hawks close to Trump – Ross, Lighthizer and Navarro – seem to be having an increasing influence on Trump, and they seem eager to reach a new deal with...

We see little risk of NAFTA falling apart in the near term, but question marks remain about the US’s commitment to free trade in the longer term.NAFTA renegotiation talks, which have hit a wall as a result of the US’s blatantly mercantilist and protectionist approach, will resume in mid-November in Mexico against the backdrop of some heavy-handed anti-dumping initiatives by the US authorities, with the slapping of punitive trade tariffs on some Canada-manufactured airplanes in October still...