Attention to the Unseen

The Guardian reports: The European Union’s trade chief has struck a defiant tone after Donald Trump threatened to place a 50% tariff on all goods from the bloc, saying any potential trade deal between Brussels and Washington must be based on “respect not threats”. The US president made his announcement after voicing frustration with the pace of progress on a trade agreement with the EU. The new rates would come into effect from 1 June. The EU trade commissioner, Maroš…

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CNBC reports: President Donald Trump on Friday said he is “recommending a straight 50% Tariff on the European Union” after complaining that trade negotiations have stalled. The steep new import duties would start June 1, Trump wrote on Truth Social. The EU “has been very difficult to deal with,” Trump wrote of the 27-nation bloc. “Our discussions with them are going nowhere!” Asked later Friday if he was looking to cut a deal with the EU in the next nine…

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The New York Times reports: The market for U.S. government bonds, the bedrock of the global financial system, continued to shudder on Thursday, as President Trump’s bill to extend expensive tax cuts and create new ones without significantly slashing spending passed through the House of Representatives. The bill has unnerved investors, deepening worries that the country’s debt is becoming unmanageable. Yields on U.S. bonds, which underpin consumer and business interest rates around the world, from mortgages to corporate loans, have…

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The New York Times reports: The United States hit its record debt level at the end of 1945, after a world war and the Great Depression. That record, in which the debt was briefly larger than the size of the entire economy, is almost certain to be broken in the next several years. Estimates from the Congressional Budget Office published in January showed that the country was on track to overtake it in 2032 — and that was before the…

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The Washington Post reports: President Donald Trump is trying to force down drug prices to specific levels. He has directed tariff rates on virtually every country. He declared that the Federal Reserve “must” lower interest rates. He takes a personal interest in the fate of individual companies like TikTok. He appears frequently with CEOs to tout investment deals, including many that were hatched before his presidency. And in his just-concluded Middle East trip, Trump pitched business leaders on doing business…

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The Guardian reports: Summarizing his befuddlement with numbers, Mark Twain observed that there were “lies, damned lies and statistics”. The acerbic phrase later become so deeply embedded in popular consciousness that it once formed the title to an episode of The West Wing, NBC’s portrayal of a fictitious US president played by Martin Sheen. Now professional economists and number-crunchers fear the aphorism could become a White House theme in real life. Buffeted by global markets and public opinion – both…

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The Wall Street Journal reports: The owner of a San Francisco card-game company cashed in his money-market funds. The founder of a tent maker is looking for investors. A watch and jewelry company in Colorado is holding off on signing a new office lease. And a New Hampshire consumer-product company has laid off more than half its staff. Around the country, small businesses that import goods made in China are taking actions—big and small—to try to outlast the current 145%…

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CNBC reports: The U.K. and U.S. agreed to a landmark trade deal on Thursday — yet the agreement appears to be far from free of tariffs. The deal is the first made by the United States since President Donald Trump unveiled his so-called reciprocal tariffs on countries around the world last month. The United Kingdom’s position as one of a handful of countries where the U.S. boasts a trade surplus in goods — meaning the U.S. exports more to the…

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CNBC reports: China’s exports surged in April on the back of a jump in shipments to Southeast Asian countries, offsetting a sharp drop in outbound goods to the U.S. as prohibitive tariffs kicked in. Exports jumped 8.1% last month in U.S. dollar terms from a year earlier, according to data released by customs authority on Friday, sharply beating Reuters’ poll estimates of a 1.9% rise. Imports slumped by just 0.2% in April from a year earlier, compared with economists’ expectations…

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Juliette Kayyem writes: The economy, and the supply chains that allow it to function, can adjust fairly quickly to certain shocks, including weather disasters and even a pandemic. Early in the COVID shutdowns, toilet paper was in short supply as Americans spent more time at home and less at workplaces and schools. The problem eased as manufacturers ramped up production, transportation systems adapted, and consumer anxiety decreased. But Trump’s trade war is different because it is unpredictable and indefinite. Even…

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The New York Times reports: Small-ticket items shipped to the United States from China will no longer be exempt from tariffs starting on Friday, when a decision by President Trump to shutter a shipping loophole he calls a “scam” takes effect. The move is expected to send ripples through the economy as American consumers, who have gotten used to buying cheap shoes, Hawaiian shirts, holiday decorations and other products made in China, suddenly find those products much pricier. The fallout…

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Rolling Stone reports: Donald Trump’s trade wars with China and other nations are widely expected to cause sharp economic pain, but some experts have warned consumers not to hoard supplies and goods before prices skyrocket, arguing that mass stockpiling could backfire spectacularly. Well, many Americans aren’t listening to that advice, according to survey data this year, instead preparing for the possibility of store shelves being bare amid a Trump-inflicted recession. Funnily enough, this includes a number of government officials and…

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  The New York Times reports: The Senate on Wednesday rejected an effort to undo President Trump’s sweeping tariffs on most U.S. trading partners, even as a small group of Republicans joined Democrats in delivering a rebuke to a trade policy that many lawmakers fear is causing economic harm. The vote deadlocked at 49 to 49, meaning it failed despite three Republicans joining Democrats in favor of a measure that sought to terminate the national emergency declaration Mr. Trump used…

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