Online Reporter
China has announced it will impose additional tariffs of 34 percent on US imports in retaliation to duties unveiled by President Donald Trump recently, thereby moving the world closer to a full-blown trade war.
The Ministry of Commerce said on Friday that the tariff, which matches Trump’s latest increase in duties on Beijing, will be imposed on all imported goods from the US from April 10, a day after the US’s “reciprocal” levies come into effect.
Global stock markets extended their losses on Friday after the announcement, with futures tracking the S&P 500 down 2 percent and the Europe-wide Stoxx 600 4,4 percent lower.
Total levies on Chinese exports to the US are set to rise to more than 60 percent after Trump’s announcement of tariffs of 34 percent that come on top of existing duties.
Beijing denounced the new US duties as “a typical unilateral bullying move” that “does not comply with the rules of international trade and seriously damages the legitimate rights and interests of China”.
The trade war comes at a sensitive moment for China’s leader, Xi Jinping, who has leaned on exports to steer the world’s second-largest economy through a property sector slump and deflation.
Beijing was among the biggest targets of the “reciprocal” tariffs Trump unveiled on Wednesday.
The new duties came on top of a levy of 20 percent previously imposed on the country by the US president.
The total US charges on China’s goods will now exceed the 60 percent Trump threatened during the election campaign, which Beijing previously considered a worst-case scenario.
Trump’s move to impose steep tariffs on US trading partners around the world has convulsed markets.
On Thursday, about $2,5 trillion in market value was erased from Wall Street stocks and all of the dollar’s post-election gains were wiped out.
China on Friday also announced export bans on seven types of rare earths and added US tech companies, including drone makers Skydio and Brinc Drones, to its “unreliable entity” list, which bans Chinese suppliers from selling components to them. – ft.com
