The United States has begun collecting President Donald Trump’s unilateral 10 per cent tariff on imports from many countries.
Among those first hit with the “baseline” tariff are Australia, Britain, Colombia, Argentina, Egypt and Saudi Arabia.
The 10 per cent charge took effect at US seaports, airports and customs warehouses at 12:01 am ET (6:01pm AEDT) on Saturday, ushering in Mr Trump’s full rejection of the post-World War II system of mutually agreed tariff rates.
Higher levies on goods from 57 larger trading partners are due to start next week.
“This is the single biggest trade action of our lifetime,” said Kelly Ann Shaw, a trade lawyer at Hogan Lovells and former White House trade adviser during Mr Trump’s first term.
Ms Shaw told a Brookings Institution event on Thursday that she expected the tariffs to evolve over time as countries seek to negotiate lower rates.
“But this is huge. This is a pretty seismic and significant shift in the way that we trade with every country on earth,” she said.
On Saturday, Mr Trump doubled down on the sweeping tariffs he unleashed around the world, vowing that his “economic revolution” will yield historic results for Americans.
“HANG TOUGH, it won’t be easy, but the end result will be historic,” he said on his Truth Social platform.
He added that his economic policies were “bringing back jobs and businesses like never before”.
Mr Trump’s tariff announcement on Wednesday shook global stock markets to their core, wiping out $US5 trillion in stock market value for S&P 500 companies by Friday’s close, a record two-day decline.
Prices for oil and commodities plunged, while investors fled to the safety of government bonds.
A US Customs and Border Protection bulletin to shippers indicated no grace period for cargoes on the water at midnight on Saturday.
But a US Customs and Border Protection bulletin did provide a 51-day grace period for cargoes loaded onto vessels or planes and in transit to the US before 12:01 am ET on Saturday.
These cargoes needed to arrive by this time to avoid the 10 per cent duty.
Higher levies to come
At midnight on Wednesday, local time, Mr Trump’s higher “reciprocal” tariff rates of 11 to 50 per cent will also take effect.
European Union imports will be hit with a 20 per cent tariff, while Chinese goods will be hit with a 34 per cent tariff, bringing Mr Trump’s total new levies on China to 54 per cent.
Vietnam, which benefited from the shift of US supply chains away from China after Mr Trump’s first-term trade war with Beijing, will be hit with a 46 per cent tariff and agreed on Friday to discuss a deal with the US president.
Canada and Mexico were exempt from both of the latest duties because they are still subject to a 25 per cent tariff related to the US fentanyl crisis for goods that do not comply with the US-Mexico-Canada rules of origin.
Mr Trump is excluding goods subject to separate 25 per cent national security tariffs, including steel and aluminium, cars, trucks and auto parts.
His administration also released a list of more than 1,000 product categories exempted from the tariffs.
Valued at US$645 billion ($1 trillion) in 2024 imports, these include crude oil, petroleum products and other energy imports, pharmaceuticals, uranium, titanium, lumber and semiconductors and copper.
Except for energy, Mr Trump’s administration is investigating several of these sectors for further national security tariffs.
Reuters
