Crypto News: Supply Lines: Gaming out Trump tariffs

World leaders and major investors have spent the two weeks since the US election wondering whether President-elect Donald Trump will follow through fully on his campaign threats to impose universal tariffs.

The latest trade worrier was hedge-fund titan Ken Griffin, who appeared Monday at the Oxford Union in the UK and said he was "very anxious" about Trump's potential use of tariffs. But the billionaire sounded optimistic that the new White House will deal with "regulatory overreach" and help the US economy go back to "the business of business."

At Bloomberg's "Future of Greek Finance Symposium" in Athens yesterday, European Central Bank Governing Council member Yannis Stournaras said this about American intentions to boost import taxes: "If I can advise our friends in the United States, this is my advice: don't do it."

Speaking to a committee in Parliament's upper chamber yesterday, UK Business and Trade Secretary Jonathan Reynolds said that tariffs on British exports to the US would be "a difficult thing for us to have to contend with" given the stakes — a bilateral trade relationship worth the £300 billion ($380 billion).

BE's Base Case

But the concern about the worst-case scenario from Trump's trade policies might be overblown, according to a new analysis from Bloomberg Economics. (Click here to read the full report on the Terminal.)

The base case from Bloomberg Economics sees Trump raising the aggregate US weighted tariff by 5 percentage points to 8% by the end of 2026 — with China getting hit hardest.

"That's a meaningful increase, though well short of what Trump proposed on the campaign trail," Anna Wong, BE's chief US economist, and BE economist Nicole Gorton-Caratelli, wrote in their report.

QuickTake: Why Trump's Plan to Escalate Tariffs Has Many Haters

Part of their expectations stem from the battle playing out this week over who will get the top economic posts in Trump's administration. Names like Scott Bessent, Howard Lutnick, Kevin Warsh, Kevin Hassett — heavy hitters in finance and economics who are far more familiar to Wall Street than to Main Street — don't sound like particularly hawkish picks when it comes to China and protectionism.

"Once the president-elect takes office, we expect to see a less extreme version of those promises," the BE economists wrote. "That range of candidates suggests to us that a Trump II administration could include voices to counterbalance tariff hardliners like former US Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer."

—Brendan Murray in London

Click here for more of Bloomberg.com's most-read stories about trade, supply chains and shipping.

Cutting the cord | An undersea data cable connecting Finland and Germany was severed in the early hours of Monday, authorities said. The 1,200-kilometer high-speed fiber optic Helsinki-Rostock link serving data centers is damaged in the Baltic Sea east of southern Sweden. German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius said the damage has to be investigated as an act of sabotage, pointing to Russia as posing a hybrid and military threat to the European Union.

Huawei's ambitions to create more powerful chips for AI and smartphones have hit major snags because of US sanctions, stalling a major Chinese effort to match American technology. Separately, the US plans to award $285 million to a new semiconductor research center focused on digital twin technology.
Ukraine warned New Delhi that Russian firms are setting up fronts in India to skirt US sanctions, a development that could hurt India's ties with Western partners wary of technology and weapons falling into the hands of Moscow.
The US Commerce Department ratcheted up tariffs on Nippon Steel just as the Japanese steelmaker made an anti-import promise to gain support for its $14.1 billion takeover of US Steel.
France's powerful farming unions are taking to the streets again to seek more government support and rally against a European Union free trade deal with Latin American producers seen allowing in cheaper goods.
Vietnam's garment industry is set for continued growth next year but is looking to diversify its key export markets as it waits to see what steps Trump will take when it comes to tariffs.
Prime Minister Keir Starmer said he'd restart talks on a UK-India free trade agreement next year, setting an ambitious goal for a deal that even Rishi Sunak, Britain's first Hindu premier, couldn't secure.
Swiss watch exports fell for a second straight month in October as a sharp drop in shipments to China offset growth in the US.

Profit at China's ports could be more resilient to fluctuations in trade demand following rounds of consolidation since 2015, which likely reduced unhealthy competition, limited overcapacity and improved operating efficiency, according to Bloomberg Intelligence.
Maersk has converted the engine of one its large container vessels so it can sail on methanol in addition to traditional marine fuel, in what the company describes as the first such move in the shipping industry.
Run SPLC after an equity ticker on Bloomberg to show critical data about a company's suppliers, customers and peers.
Use the AHOY function to track global commodities trade flows.
See DSET CHOKE for a dataset to monitor shipping chokepoints.
For freight dashboards, see {BI RAIL}, {BI TRCK} and {BI SHIP} and {BI 3PLS}
Click HERE for automated stories about supply chains.
On the Bloomberg Terminal, type NH FWV for FreightWaves content.
See BNEF for BloombergNEF's analysis of clean energy, advanced transport, digital industry, innovative materials, and commodities.

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