United States President Donald Trump said on Thursday that he has asked trade officials to identify tariffs on an additional $100 billion (Rs 6.5 lakh crore) worth of Chinese imports, the latest in an escalating trade standoff with Beijing, Reuters reported.
Trump said he was responding to “unfair retaliation”, referring to China’s move to increase tariff on $50 billion (Rs 3.25 lakh crore) worth of American goods, including aircraft and automobiles. Beijing’s move, on the other hand, was a direct reaction to the US’ decision to impose $50 billion in tariffs on Chinese goods on Tuesday.
Earlier, China imposed tariffs on 128 products from the United States worth around $3 billion (Rs 19,560 crore) after the US imposed duties on steel and aluminium imports from China as part of Trump’s “America First” policy.
“Rather than remedy its misconduct, China has chosen to harm our farmers and manufacturers,” Trump said, according to The New York Times.
Trump said he has asked the United States trade representative to determine if the US could impose another $100 billion in tariffs and, “if so, to identify the products upon which to impose such tariffs”.
While Trump’s advisers have tried to play down fears of a trade war between the world’s two largest economies, the standoff seems to have hit US markets. Stock futures dropped after Trump’s latest trade directive – S&P 500 Index futures slid 1.2%, Bloomberg reported.
In Asia, however, the markets were less troubled. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng was up 1.5% while Japan’s benchmark Nikkei 225 was trading higher after the morning session, the BBC reported.
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