Trump 2.0 official thread

[siegecrossbow]

I’m not sure they want real open markets. If everything is open then Detroit will be in real trouble and he’ll complain about overcapacity like Sleepy did.

 

[FriedButter]

So US consumers are eating good, but MAGA workers and farmers are still fucked.

They are still going to get whacked. Not as hard as previously but prices are still set to raise due to shipping logistic issues.

Rick Muskat, president of family-owned shoe retailer Deer Stags, … that the 30% tariffs will allow it to resume shipments from China, but container rates will likely skyrocket due to pent-up demand. “Our costs will go up closer to 40%,” said Muskat. “So we will have to raise prices for fall deliveries.”

Steve Lamar, CEO of the American Apparel and Footwear Association … “If freight rates spike due to the tariff-induced shipping disruptions, which will take months to unwind, we could see costs and prices creep up further.”

Eric Byer, CEO of the Alliance for Chemical Distribution, ... “After that, the fear sets in as the warehouses that are now in the 80-90% full range will drop precipitously, likely to less than 10% by the middle to end of June,” he said. “I suspect we will see an incredibly active ordering frenzy that will once again have too few ships ready to accommodate the demand (like Covid all over again),” he added.

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[Phead128]

I suspect that if the REM export controls are going to be removed, it would be de-emphasized and implemented under the table. Chinese domestic social media is in a furor over this announcement because it's seen as a capitulation by China, having the REM control removals additionally explicitly announced would cause an uproar.

In practice, 30% tariffs is extremely high (though the discourse around 145% tariffs have superficially cognitively primed people to view it as somehow insignificant when in material terms, the difference is not huge). Getting this agreement is a "success" for China on technical terms though it does entrench all these artificial Trump 2 tariffs as the new normal. 30% is catastrophically high, but not apocalyptically high - meaning that many US export oriented sectors in China will be able to scrape by rather than collapse (though the de minimis cancellation doesn't seem to be reversed at this moment).

The issue lies in perception. Getting slapped with 30% from the adversary and having your own side reduce retaliation to an unreciprocal 10% is bound to be spun by the Trump government as a PR win. We should be past the point in time where China still allows the US to make these kind of face-saving agreements and the bilateral relationship should have been developed to be in a position of tit-for-tat equality by now.

The Chinese side should be faulted for its messaging. Getting the entirety of society cognitively primed for a protracted economic war and total decoupling while suddenly presenting everyone with the fair accompli of an agreement is one thing (encountering this kind of whiplash is actually exasperatingly common in PRC history like the US normalization process in the 70s) but the negotiators at this talk were literally making public statements saying that "these are just preliminary talks and not to expect an agreement" during their intermission break.

Going from a stance of "never surrender" and "China emboldens the rest of the world through its example" to suddenly binding itself to - what seems on the surface as - an unreciprocal agreement like this along with the inevitable Western media and White House spin about how the 30% vs 10% differential means "China was desperate after all" is bound to be messy. For Trump and the US media, this will undoubtedly be spun (as the stock market reaction shows) as a win that will compel other countries to come to the table for tariff negotiations.

For China, pulling these kinds of moves damages domestic confidence that one's individual position aligns with that of the country's. There are still articles on Guancha by authors telling people to expect a "protracted war" and "no agreements" published immediately on their feed directly below this announcement's. Once again, Chinese domestic media is likely going to fall in a position of never taking any strong stances and perpetually hedging because no one can predict their country's position won't suddenly change.

More importantly, this agreement shows that China is not prepared for an economic showdown with the US or its hegemony at this time. This was a rare opportunity for decoupling on entirely Chinese terms where the US culpability means that China could not be blamed for any measures it took in response. It would have been undoubtedly painful but it would have forced Chinese economic production to undergo the cold turkey-style painful transition to internal circulation and Global South reorientation with the least amount of resentment towards the government through the US having unambiguously incited the entire confrontation and firing the first shot.

Whether based on top level assessments of the material conditions of China's economic dependency on the US or just lobbying pressures within the CPC, it shows that China is still constrained by its reliance on the existing economic order.

The 30% is because of the fentanyl (20% on top of flat 10% for everyone). I guarantee you fentanyl will be resolved in next few weeks, that's a low-hanging fruit.

So when China gets the same flat 10% treatment as rest of world for 90 days, I would say easily that Trump escalated for no reason and no gain, and China's steadfast resistance paid off.

Let's see if you are silent or still talkative in a few weeks.

 

[TK3600]

They are still going to get whacked. Not as hard as previously but prices are still set to raise due to shipping logistic issues.

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Did US cancel the Chinese ship port fee?

 

[iewgnem]

Did US cancel the Chinese ship port fee?

It won't be active until 6 month from now, which just means never.

 

[FriedButter]

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Trump: The EU is ‘nastier than China’​

U.S. President Donald Trump said Monday that the European Union is worse than China, hours after Washington and Beijing agreed to slash respective punitive tariffs and de-escalate their trade war.

"European Union is in many ways nastier than China, okay?" Trump said, as he lashed the bloc. "Oh, they'll come down a lot. You watch. We have all the cards. They treat us very unfairly."

Despite several attempts at negotiating with Washington to remove Trump’s tariffs on European goods, the EU has yet to achieve a breakthrough.

Trump's comments mark a significant departure from his warm words about the European Commission's president last week, in which he praised Ursula von der Leyen as “fantastic,” adding he hoped that the two would meet soon.

Although Trump has already met with a host of European leaders, von der Leyen has yet to nail down her own meeting — saying last week she’d only meet the U.S. president if there's a “concrete” trade package that can be negotiated.

Brussels last week dangled a list of potential concessions — including regulatory easing and joint efforts to curb Chinese overproduction — and threatened tariffs on €95 billion worth of U.S. goods if talks stall. Trump's trade hawk Peter Navarro condemned the mooted counteroffensive as provocative.

Trump's heated new remarks come as Washington and Beijing agreed to slash so-called reciprocal tariffs against each other, after talks between U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer and Chinese officials in Switzerland.

The U.S. will cut Trump’s recent tariffs on Chinese imports from 145 percent to 30 percent, while the Chinese side will drop measures from 125 percent to 10 percent. The suspension is temporary for now, lasting 90 days, allowing time for further negotiations.

Trump's "Liberation Day" tariffs on countries around the world and the EU triggered shockwaves in financial markets and threatened to upend global trade entirely.

As he seeks to repair perceived injustices in the way Europe has treated the U.S., Trump imposed a 10 percent baseline tariff, as well as a 25 percent levy on cars and metals, with more tariffs underway, to try bring home manufacturing jobs home that were lost to globalization.

Trump made the incendiary comments about the EU in the context of a new drug-pricing scheme he announced Monday, intended to force companies to sell drugs in the U.S. at the lowest price they offer abroad.

 

[GulfLander]

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In other words, Ron Vara has been thrown into a road side ditch. From “bringing back manufacturing” to strategic industries only.

Thought they "not want" decoupling anymore? Seems they still...

 

[Wrought]

Except there isn't a lack of consequences. What US did to China if done to a smaller economy will devastate it.

Devastate it for a month. Very big difference between that and permanent devastation.

Long term isn't independent of the short term. In the short term if US is able to extract benefits and further solidify it's control over other nations that will pose a long term threat.

They are not independent; the difference is that the US losses are mostly intangible and therefore invisible in the short term. Losses which far outweigh the tangible and visible gains.

Public opinion doesn't matter - isn't it quite clear after these years? Hard power wins. These nations and their public are going to get real pissy when it comes to America but the moment democrats come to power they will forget everything prior to it.

The fact that hard power wins in a direct contest does not mean that public opinion doesn't matter. Hard power cannot be everywhere or see everything. You cannot hold a gun to everyone's head at the same time. An empire which relies solely on hard power is an empire which is one step from collapse. Hard power is inherently brittle, and what happens when it is absent or shattered is where public opinion matters. Napoleon was hated but invincible before he invaded Russia. Afterwards he was still hated, and no longer invincible. How did it end for him?


Also, a funny line from Bessent. Classic British humour.

The Geneva agreement, he emphasised, includes a commitment by Chinese officials to ongoing talks. If that “mechanism” had already been in place, the “unfortunate escalations” that followed Mr Trump’s announcement on April 2nd could have been avoided, he said. It was an extraordinary admission. If only America’s top economic officials had hit upon the ingenious idea of meeting their Chinese counterparts in person before Liberation Day, the world’s two biggest economies might have been spared a great deal of turmoil.

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[siegecrossbow]

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Well deserved kick in the butt for those cucks.

 

[jiajia99]

Well deserved kick in the butt for those cucks.

Somehow I think I am going to enjoy this, those European warmongers do need a good smackdown and large row of broken teeth considering how crazy their leadership is right now