Tariffs, US President: 'Important letters in the offing, perhaps as early as today'

EU countries are worried by Trump's threat of 30% tariffs on imports from Europe. Describing this scenario is a report by Il Sole 24 Ore as part of the international Pulse project.

"Among the EU countries, Italy is one of the most penalised, with an average tariffs that has already risen to 8%, against Germany's 11% and France's 6.4%," reads the report. "Without forgetting that the impact for European and Italian companies is even more considerable as due to one variable, the depreciation of the dollar against the euro (-13% since the start of Trump's second term), European exports have been even more expensive in the US market.

Donald Trump is pushing for minimum tariffs of 15-20% for all European goods. This was reported by the Financial Times citing sources, according to which the US president has tightened his stance and is not even seduced by the EU's latest offer to reduce tariffs on cars.

IMF, resolve tariffs tensions, independent central banks

(ANSA) - ROME, JULY 18 - The International Monetary Fund, while seeing "resilience" in economic growth in the current phase of uncertainty due to tariffs, continues to see "downside risks" to world growth ahead of the update of its forecasts at the end of July, and calls on political leaders to "resolve trade tensions". This was said by Deputy Managing Director Gita Gopinath in a note from Durban after the final communiqué of the South African-chaired G20. "The independence of central banks must be protected," the note reads on the tensions between the Trump presidency and the Fed. "With trade and geopolitical tensions still high, risks to financial stability" remain under scrutiny, Gopinath continued.

In the final G20 communiqué there are no explicit references to the topic of tariffs or protectionism. One of the topics discussed, however, is "the main impediments to growth and development in Africa" also based on analyses by international organisations: the South African G20 presidency is looking at a "medium-term framework on how the G20 can best support growth in Africa".

G20 finance ministers and governors meeting in Durban are expected to arrive at a final communiqué that would express a common position on trade and other global challenges, despite the US offensive on tariffs that had blown up the agreement at the February meeting. This was reported by qualified sources without giving details of the commitments, however non-binding, that would be expressed in the official statement.

- "The last mile is always the most challenging and only concerted and genuine efforts on both sides will get us to the finish line". EU Commission spokesman Olof Gill said this, reiterating the will to find a tariffs agreement "beneficial for both sides of the Atlantic". "Commissioner Sefcovic had intensive talks with" US negotiators Howard Lutnick and Jamieson Greer "and also met with the director of the US National Economic Council, Kevin Hasset: it was a new opportunity to seek a negotiated solution, demonstrating our constructive and good-faith commitment."

The EU continues to be 'very eager' to negotiate on tariffs, White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt said in a briefing with reporters.

The Department of Commerce is set to impose tariffs of 93.5% on Chinese imports of graphite, a key element in batteries. This was reported by Bloomberg news agency, according to which a final decision is expected by 5 December. The tariffs would be in addition to existing ones, bringing the effective tariff to 160%.

EU Commissioner Maros Sefcovic and his negotiating team are today engaged in two separate meetings with US trade officials, Jamieson Greer and Howard Lutnick, to seek a crackdown on tariffs. A communication on the outcome of the confrontation is expected in the evening. According to sources close to the negotiations, Brussels has already agreed to soften some of its most rigid positions in the hope of closing a deal by 1 August and averting the 30% tariffs threatened by Donald Trump. However, the most delicate dossiers remain on the table: cars, pharmaceuticals, agribusiness and the long-standing Airbus-Boeing dispute. The EU's objective remains a compromise that keeps tariffs between 10% and 15%, although a more onerous scenario with a rate of up to 20% is not ruled out.

'For me Trump's letter on the 50 per cent tariffs was a surprise, not only because of the size of the tariffs but also because of how they were announced. I thought it was fake news,' Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva said in an interview with CNN. Lula said that 'Trump was elected to govern the United States, not to be the emperor of the world'. "It would be better to negotiate first and then reach an eventual agreement because our countries have had good relations for 200 years. He broke many protocols, it was very unfortunate," he added, saying he was ready to negotiate but also ready for possible countermeasures.

Donald Trump intends to write to many nations to set a unilateral across-the-board rate, probably 10% or 15%. "We're going to have well over 150 countries that we're going to send a payment notice to," he told reporters, according to reports in a number of US media outlets, including Wsj, Politico and Bloomberg.

"The impact of US tariffs could be significant: if the rate were to rise to 30%, we estimate up to 38 billion euro less in exports to the United States, out of 65 billion in current exports". This was stated by Alessandro Fontana, director of the Confindustria Study Centre, when presenting the first data on the potential impact of the US tariffs on the sidelines of the presentation of the survey on investments by companies in Emilia-Romagna drawn up by Confindustria. "The devaluation of the dollar by 13% since the beginning of the year makes the gap even wider," he explained, "In practice, with tariffs at 10% for many Italian companies, selling in America would be 23% more expensive than in 2023, which corresponds to about 20 billion in losses to the United States in total exports. If tariffs were to increase, "the impact would be even greater," he warns.

According to Fontana, the regions most affected would be those with the highest manufacturing added value: Lombardy, Emilia-Romagna and Tuscany. "Ninety-nine per cent of the affected exports would be manufacturing goods. The mechanical industry in particular is exposed'. "Many entrepreneurs," he adds, "had planned production expansions to meet US demand. Now they are freezing investments. Also at risk is the related employment". This situation "greatly increases uncertainty," he concludes, "we have all the indicators of uncertainty that are higher than during the lockdown period" and also for families "the propensity to save is increasing," Fontana concludes.