The customs plans announced by US President Donald Trump, including special tariffs of 25 percent on steel and aluminum imports, are “economically a high-risk game” for the WiFo and WU retail economists Harald Oberhofer. In the United States, part of the tariffs would have to pay companies through higher advance payment prices and consumers through higher end customer prices, said Oberhofer. Foreign companies would have to shoulder the other part of the US criminal duties.
The trading expert expects a more violent trade conflict between the USA and the EU than in 2018 and negative effects on the global economy. A trade dispute between the USA and the EU had already existed in Trump’s first term. In 2018, the Republican introduced special tariffs on steel and aluminum imports, the EU reacted with special tariffs to US products such as Bourbon Whiskey, Harley-Davidson-Motorcorrads and Jeans. The measures announced by Trump in the first two weeks of his term in office would have “a completely different dimension” than in 2018, said Oberhofer. Customs are “an essential agenda of his economic policy”.
243,000 tons from Austria
The announced special tariffs of 25 percent of all US steel and aluminum imports in Austria mainly meet the Linz steel company Voestalpine and the Innviertel aluminum group Amag. The stock exchanges first reacted to the defense tariffs calmly. The Voestalpine share lost 1 percent until noon, and the amag papers unchanged.
About a quarter of the steel used in the USA is imported, the majority of it from the neighboring countries of Mexico and Canada and by narrow allies in Asia and Europe such as Japan, South Korea and Germany. The Austrian steel exports to the United States were 243,000 tons. In this way, Austria ranked 18th, which emerges from the US steel import monitor of the International Trade Administration of the U.S. Ministry of Economics. The United States is an important market for Voestalpine, which also produces on site in the USA.
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Source: Nachrichten
