Online Reporter
The European Union has finalised a second list of countermeasures to target US goods worth €72 billion (US$84 billion), including Boeing aircraft, automobiles and bourbon if it decides to retaliate as transatlantic trade tensions intensify.
The additional duties would also be slapped on machinery products, chemicals and plastics, medical devices, electrical equipment, wines and other agricultural goods, according to a 206-page list prepared by the European Commission and seen by Bloomberg News.
The list, initially hitting American goods totalling €95 billion, was cut down after consultations with companies and member states. Countries must give their approval before the list’s adoption.
The suite of measures represents the EU’s response to President Donald Trump’s earlier so-called reciprocal tariff of 20 percent hitting most goods and the additional levies on cars and car parts of 25 percent. The universal rate was later temporarily lowered to 10 percent to allow negotiations to take place.
European Commission representatives did not immediately respond to a request for comment early Tuesday morning.
The list, which was reported earlier by Politico, does not include a tariff rate for the goods.
Over the weekend, Trump said he would raise EU tariffs to 30 percent on August 1, which the bloc’s trade chief Maros Sefcovic called “effectively prohibitive” to transatlantic trade. EU trade ministers met in Brussels on Monday to discuss next steps.
Sefcovic was planning to speak with US Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick late Monday to continue negotiations that the EU insists must be mutually beneficial to both sides. — Bloomberg
