Tariffs remain impediment to US-China Trade

Much has changed since our last TradePrism update in March. For starters, the US and China have lowered bi-lateral tariffs by more than 100%-pts each, with US tariffs on Chinese imports now just 30% higher than last year. Still, tariffs remain much higher than they were in our March update, which assumed tariffs on China would remain around 20% higher than last year and that tariffs would be used sparingly on the rest of the world.

Our latest TradePrism forecasts show an 18% decline in exports from China to the US compared to our March forecasts. Even so, that’s considerably healthier than the 30% decline which we modelled would occur under the 145% tariffs in place at the end of April.

We expect most countries to see a decline in trade with the US and with China as weaker demand weighs on purchases. Even so, some economies including the EU, Vietnam and India are expected to see their share of US imports grow. The US is set to decline sharply as a share of global trade. China’s share of global trade is also set to decline, albeit by a much smaller margin. Europe will be the relative winner, extending its importance within the global trading system.