Speaking to workers at a plant in the West Midlands that makes Jaguar and Land Rover vehicles for the export market, Starmer said his government would continue to try to negotiate a trade deal with the United States while championing free trade around the world.
Jaguar Land Rover on Saturday announced that it was pausing shipments to the U.S. for the month of April as it works out how to respond to the 25% tax on imported cars that took effect last week.
Starmer announced some help for the British car industry, providing additional flexibility in meeting the government’s 2030 deadline for phasing out gasoline- and diesel-power cars, extending the deadline for hybrids to 2035 and offering tax breaks for buyers of electric vehicles.
Slide in oil prices deepens
Oil prices are falling Monday, extending their slide from last week, as investors anticipate that a trade war will chill global economic growth.
The price of benchmark U.S. crude oil is down 1.1% to $61.32 a barrel. Earlier in the day, it briefly dipped below $60 a barrel for the first time since 2021.
U.S. crude is down 14.2% so far this month.
Brent crude, the international standard, is down 1% to $64.88 a barrel.
Bitcoin and other cryptos see large price drops
After holding relatively stable during last week’s global market turmoil, cryptocurrencies have joined the sell-off.
Bitcoin, the world’s most popular cryptocurrency dipped below $75,000 Monday morning before seeing a slight rebound.
Bitcoin’s prices haven’t been this low since just after President Donald Trump’s Election Day victory last year launched a bull run in crypto prices.
Bitcoin’s backers say it is a type of digital gold that can act as a hedge against volatility. But Garrick Hileman, an independent cryptocurrency analyst, said bitcoin’s price slide shows that thesis still hasn’t proven to be true.
“It’s just not there today,” he said. “(Bitcoin) trades like a risky tech stock.”
Other major digital assets, like ether, XRP and solana, saw even bigger one-day percentage drops on Monday morning.
Bond yields are mixed after brief rally
Treasury yields are mixed in Monday morning trading on the bond market after briefly rallying in the early going.
The yield on the 10-year Treasury rose to 4.09% from 4.01% late Friday. It had fallen as low as 3.88% overnight.
The yield, which influences interest rates on mortgages and other consumer loans, was nearing 4.8% in mid-January.
The two-year yield, which closely tracks expectations for action by the Federal Reserve, was steady at 3.68%.
A White House account on X says it was ‘fake news’ that Trump was considering a tariff pause
The account, @RapidResponse47, weighed in shortly after the market spiked, then dropped again.
Stock market spikes, reacting to White House report that president may pause tariffs
The stock market briefly spiked on a report that Kevin Hassett, a top White House economic adviser, said the president was considering a 90-day pause on tariffs.
The supposed remark from Hassett circulated on social media, but no one could pinpoint where it came from even as the market flashed from red to green.
Hassett had spoken to Fox News earlier in the morning, when he was asked about a potential pause. However, he was noncommittal.
“I think the president is going to decide what the president is going to decide,” he said.
The episode showed that traders were operating on a hair trigger and eager for any sign of encouraging news for the market.
Stocks are sharply swinging down, up, then down again on Wall Street
The Dow Jones Industrial Average briefly erased a morning loss of 1,700 points, shot up more than 800 points, then went back to a loss of 629 points.
The S&P 500 likewise made sudden up-and-down lurching movements and was down 0.7% in the first hour of trading. The Nasdaq composite was up 0.2% That followed sharp drops around the world as worries rise about whether Trump’s trade war will torpedo the global economy.
A big Tesla bull slams Musk, slashes stock price target
Wedbush analyst Dan Ives says Elon Musk’s association with President Trump and his tariffs will turn off potential Tesla buyers in China, the company’s second largest market. Ives writes that Musk’s embrace of right-wing politics is destroying demand for his electric vehicles in the U.S. and Europe, too.
“This could be a brutal year ahead if Musk does not exit stage left or take a step back on DOGE in the coming month,” Ives writes, referring to the Tesla CEO’s leadership of the government cost-cutting group. “With major protests erupting globally at Tesla dealerships, Tesla cars being keyed, and a full brand crisis tornado turning into a life of its own, this has cast a dark black cloud over Tesla’s stock.”
Even before Trump’s tariffs, Tesla stock had plunged more than 40% from its mid-December high.
Ives’ new price target of $315 still assumes big gains. Tesla was trading Monday morning at $229, down more than 4%.
Japan's prime minister told Trump he is concerned the tariffs will discourage investment from Japan
Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba said he spoke on the telephone with Trump on Monday night and told him he is “strongly concerned” that U.S. tariffs would discourage investment from Japan, which has been the world’s biggest investor in the United States in the past five years.
Ishiba said he urged Trump to seek a more mutually beneficial bilateral cooperation, and that Japan will keep negotiating to get the U.S. government reconsider the measures.
The two leaders reaffirmed their efforts to resolve the issue, and agreed to appoint a team of representatives on each side for further negotiations.
Ishiba said his government will hold a first ministerial taskforce meeting to tackle what he called “a national crisis.”
The prime minister told a parliamentary session earlier Monday that he doesn’t think the problem can be resolved unless Japan makes a counter proposal and that Japan needs to propose how the two countries can make a new relationship as a package. Ishiba, however, said he is not considering a retaliatory measure because it only makes things worse.
Ishiba said the government will do everything it can to help the industries affected, especially small and medium sized business owners.
Wall Street opens sharply lower
Wall Street is sinking again, following other global markets, as worries deepen about whether Trump’s trade war will torpedo the global economy.
The S&P 500 fell 3.8% in early trading Monday, coming off its worst week since COVID began crashing the global economy in March 2020.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 1,200 points, and the Nasdaq composite was 4% lower.
European markets saw losses of 4% or more. In Asia, stocks in Hong Kong plunged 13.2% for their worst day since 1997. Japan’s Nikkei index tumbled nearly 8%.
European Union will focus on global trade outside the US
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen says the European Union is looking to do more business elsewhere in the world as President Trump’s tariffs hit international trade.
She said Monday that the EU is also is setting up a taskforce to monitor any dumping on its markets that might happen as trade patterns change.
“We will focus like a laser beam on the 83% of global trade that is beyond the United States. Vast opportunities,” von der Leyen said. After deals already done with Mexico and Switzerland, she said, “we’re working on India, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia and many others.”
Von der Leyen says the taskforce will help to monitor any unexpected surges in imports and “protect ourselves against indirect effects through trade diversion.”
The European Commission negotiates trade deals and disputes on behalf of the 27 EU member countries.
Von der Leyen insists the EU still wants a deal with the Trump administration, but that “we are preparing a potential list for retaliation, and other measures for retaliation, if this is necessary.”
JPMorgan CEO says tariffs will slow economy
JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon says the
Trump administration’s trade policies
will likely result in higher prices for both imported and domestic goods and services, weighing on an already slowing U.S. economy.
In his annual letter to shareholders, released Monday, Dimon said the U.S. economy already faced a number of challenges: sticky inflation, geopolitical tensions,
Federal Reserve policy
including still-high interest rates and high fiscal deficits. Dimon also said that many stocks in the market have been priced too high.
The outspoken and influential CEO often comments on both domestic and international issues.
“Whether or not the menu of tariffs causes a recession remains in question, but it will slow down growth,” Dimon wrote, while also saying “I still have an abiding faith in America.”
Goldman Sachs says tariff announcement may have caused irreversible damage
The financial firm said a recession has become more likely even if Trump retreats from his trade policies.
Goldman Sachs also reduced its expectations for economic growth “following a sharp tightening in financial conditions, foreign consumer boycotts, and a continued spike in policy uncertainty that is likely to depress capital spending by more than we had previously assumed.”
But even meeting those expectations “would now require a large reduction in the tariffs scheduled to take effect on April 9.”
Finger pointing as markets plunge
The dispute over tariffs has caused some fracturing within Trump’s political coalition.
Hedge fund manager Bill Ackman said the president was “launching a global economic war against the whole world at once” and urged him to “call a time out.”
“We are heading for a self-induced, economic nuclear winter,” he wrote on X on Sunday.
Top White House economic adviser Kevin Hassett told Fox News on Monday morning that Ackman should “ease off the rhetoric a little bit.”
Hassett said critics were exaggerating the impact of trade disputes and talk of an “economic nuclear winter” was “completely irresponsible rhetoric.”
Hong Kong stock market slumps but official warns against drastic action
Hong Kong Financial Secretary Paul Chan says the current volatility in the market does not warrant any drastic measures to be taken, vowing the city will remain a free port.
After the city’s stock market slumped 13.2% on Monday, Chan told reporters that it was functioning in an orderly manner, with substantial selling and buying interests. But the U.S. tariffs will inevitably cause market fluctuations and retaliatory measures and interest rate policy from other countries will trigger more volatile capital flows.
He blasted the latest U.S. tariffs as “bullying and unreasonable,” saying they have disrupted global supply chains and severely impacted the global economic recovery process.
Hong Kong, a former British colony which returned to China in 1997, enjoys semiautonomy that allows its policies and economic system to be different from mainland China’s.
German exports to the US grew in February as firms anticipated tariffs
Germany has reported a large increase in exports to the United States in February, ahead of U.S. President Donald Trump’s announcement of sweeping tariffs.
Germany has Europe’s biggest economy and is a leading exporter. Last year, the United States was its biggest single trading partner for the first time in nearly a decade, displacing China.
The Federal Statistical Office said Monday that Germany’s exports to the U.S. were up 8.5% in February compared with the previous month, at 14.2 billion euros ($15.6 billion). German exports to the entire world, including other EU nations, were up 1.8% in the same period at 131.6 billion euros.
The head of Germany’s exporters association, the BGA, said the February increase “must not deceive us” as the rise in exports to the U.S. was due to “anticipatory effects.”
Dirk Jandura said in a statement that “U.S. firms bunkered and German firms moved deliveries forward.”
He added that “Germany and the EU must quickly find their role in the new world order” and “approach the global South with pragmatic offers.”
Jandura argued that “the sweeping U.S. blow offers a unique opportunity to position Europe as a reliable and trustworthy partner.”
German economy minister calls US tariffs ‘nonsense’
Germany’s economy minister says the premise of U.S. President Donald Trump’s wide-ranging tariffs is “nonsense,” and he is arguing that Europe is in a strong position.
Robert Habeck, who is also vice chancellor in Germany’s outgoing government, said as he arrived at a meeting of European Union trade ministers in Luxembourg Monday that he and his colleagues must act “calmly, prudently but also clearly and with determination.”
He said that means “being clear that we are in a strong position — America is in a position of weakness.” He argued that “we don’t have time pressure now,” but the U.S. does.
Habeck said it’s important for the EU to stick together, arguing that attempts by individual countries to win exemptions haven’t worked in the past. He stressed the importance of trade agreements and contacts with other regions of the world, such as South America, Asia and the Pacific.
The German minister said of Trump’s tariffs that “even the basis of the calculation is nonsense: The assumption that a trade budget surplus or deficit is a problem in itself is a wrong estimation.”
Indonesia says it won’t retaliate against Trump’s tariffs
Indonesia says it won’t retaliate against Trump’s 32% tariff but will pursue diplomacy and negotiations to seek mutually beneficial solutions.
Indonesia, which had an $18 billion trade surplus with the U.S. last year, will gather input from business leaders to create a strategy for addressing the tariffs and find ways to reduce the deficit, Coordinating Economic Affairs Minister Airlangga Hartarto said Monday.
“We will increase the volume of purchases so that the $18 billion trade deficit can be reduced,” Hartarto said.
China accuses US of unilateralism, protectionism and economic bullying
China on Monday accused the United States of unilateralism, protectionism and economic bullying with tariffs.
“Putting ‘America First’ over international rules is a typical act of unilateralism, protectionism and economic bullying,” Foreign Affairs spokesperson Lin Jian told reporters.
Last week, Trump put an additional 34% tariff on Chinese goods, on top of two rounds of 10% tariffs already declared in February and March, which Trump said was due to Beijing’s role in the fentanyl crisis. China and other governments retaliated quickly. China announced its own 34% tariff rate on U.S. goods.
Lin said the new tariffs harmed the stability of global production and supply chains and seriously impacted the world’s economic recovery.
“Pressure and threats are not the way to deal with China. China will firmly safeguard its legitimate rights and interests,” Lin added.
European shares plunge in early trading
European shares dropped in early trading, with Germany’s DAX falling 6.5% to 19,311.29. In Paris, the CAC 40 shed 5.7% to 6,861.27, while Britain’s FTSE 100 lost 4.5% to 7,694.00.
South Korea’s top trade negotiator will visit Washington
South Korea’s top trade negotiator will visit Washington this week to express Seoul’s concerns over the Trump administration’s increased tariffs and discuss ways to mitigate their negative impact on South Korean businesses.
South Korea’s Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy said Monday that its minister of trade, Inkyo Cheong, plans to meet with various U.S. officials, including U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer.
The ministry says Cheong aims to gather detailed information on the Trump administration’s trade policies and engage in discussions to reduce the 25% tariffs placed on South Korean products.
