By Agencies – published by CNA and AP – published by Yahoo!News
Washington – The United States of America will slap an additional 100 percent tariff on imports from China and impose export controls on all critical US-made software from November 1, President Donald Trump said on Friday (Oct. 10).
In a post on Truth Social, Trump said: “Starting November 1st, 2025 (or sooner, depending on any further actions or changes taken by China), the United States of America will impose a Tariff of 100 percent on China, over and above any Tariff that they are currently paying.”
Trump said the extra levies, plus US export controls on “any and all critical software,” would come into effect from November 1 in retaliation for what he called Beijing’s “extraordinarily aggressive” moves.
“It is impossible to believe that China would have taken such an action, but they have, and the rest is History,” he said on Truth Social.
Stock markets fell as the simmering trade war between the United States and China reignited, with the NASDAQ down 3.6 percent and the S&P 500 down 2.7 percent.
Chinese goods currently face US tariffs of 30 percent under tariffs that Trump brought in while accusing Beijing of aiding in the fentanyl trade, and over alleged unfair practices.
China’s retaliatory tariffs are currently at 10 percent.
Trump had threatened the tariffs hours earlier in a lengthy surprise post on his Truth Social network that said China had sent letters to countries around the world detailing export controls on rare earth minerals.
China’s new restrictions
On Thursday, the Chinese government restricted access to rare earth minerals, requiring foreign companies to get special approval for shipping the metallic elements abroad. It also announced permitting requirements on exports of technologies used in the mining, smelting and recycling of rare earths, adding that any export requests for products used in military goods would be rejected.
Gracelin Baskaran, director of the Critical Minerals Security Programme at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C., said China holds leverage because it dominates the market for rare earths with 70% of the mining and 93% of the production of permanent magnets made from them, which are crucial to high-tech products and the military.
“These restrictions undermine our ability to develop our industrial base at a time when we need to. And then second, it’s a powerful negotiating tool,” she said.
Craig Singleton, senior director of the China programme at the Foundation for Defence of Democracies, a think tank, said Trump’s post could “mark the beginning of the end of the tariff truce” that had lowered the tax rates charged by both countries.
“Mutually assured disruption between the two sides is no longer a metaphor,” Singleton said. “Both sides are reaching for their economic weapons at the same time, and neither seems willing to back down.”
CAPTION:
File photo of US President Donald Trump as he attends a bilateral meeting with China’s President Xi Jinping during the G20 leaders summit in Osaka, Japan, on June 29, 2019. Photo: Reuters/Kevin Lamarque and published by CNA
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