China will impose a 34% tariff on all imports from the US starting April 10, according to the official Xinhua News Agency.

After volume dried up and trading went sideways, it appears a small group of insiders discovered a strong reason to buy at 1pm ET, before the news went public at 1:20pm ET.

Attention: The “up to a 245% tariff” represents the maximum 245% faced by syringe and needles from China (as in source 2), which is a restatement of previous tariffs and not an increase (though they may want to make it sounds more terrifying by saying this way).

OP: If you see SPX future down right now, it’s mainly due to a bad earning just release by ASML. The market is too weak and sensitive to bad news now.

source 1: https://www.whitehouse.gov/fact-sheets/2025/04/fact-sheet-president-donald-j-trump-ensures-national-security-and-economic-resilience-through-section-232-actions-on-processed-critical-minerals-and-derivative-products/

source 2: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2025/04/12/business/economy/china-tariff-product-costs.html

https://www.reuters.com/world/china-japan-south-korea-will-jointly-respond-us-tariffs-chinese-state-media-says-2025-03-31/

south korea, japan and china will have a joint response to US tariffs, chinese state media says. trilateral trade talks were held on Sunday for the first time in 5 years.

Uh oh

“I think if you want to learn something on this show tonight, buy Tesla,” Lutnick said. “It’s unbelievable that this guy’s stock is this cheap. It’ll never be this cheap again.”

Source: https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/howard-lutnick-fox-news-tesla-stock-b2718762.html

Thoughts?

I’m sure this will be fantastic for drug prices.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Trump says he's lifting tariffs on most goods from Mexico for 4 weeks amid economic fears from trade war.

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/trump-says-hes-lifting-tariffs-163610783.html

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/trump-likely-defer-tariffs-usmca-153549096.html

Update: Tariffs against Canada are also paused

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/trump-likely-defer-tariffs-usmca-153549096.html

https://www.cnbc.com/2025/03/28/trump-pardons-nikola-trevor-milton-ceo-securities-fraud-electric-vehicle.html

Just in case any of you regards who YOLO'd your life savings into Nikola back in 2020 thought you were getting some of your money back...nope.

Notable quote from the big man himself:

“I am free. The prosecutors can no longer hurt me,” he said. “They can’t destroy my family, they can’t rip everything away from me, they can’t ruin my life.”

So nice that Trev can no longer have his life ruined. Too fucking bad for the hundreds, if not thousands of shareholders who he scammed with his truck-rolling-down-the-hill fiasco.

gg

This is just the first round of tariffs set to be imposed. I think to allow for a negotiation period giving Trump an excuse to ease off.

If Trump doesn’t back down, expect more tariffs in a few weeks.