The US-UK trade pact will leave the 10% tariff in place – report

This is a bad sign for hopes that we could get back to 0%. It indicates that 10% is a floor and I don’t think many countries are going to go for that.

From the White House CNN reporter:

Trump’s trade announcement with the UK will be limited in scope, heavy on future commitments & leave the existing 10% universal tariffs in place, a US & UK official tell Phil Mattingly [a fellow CNN reporter]

That’s not good.

An optimist might hope that as some of those ‘future commitments’ are met there is a path to removing the 10% so let’s wait and see. But I just can’t see major US trading partners rolling over on a deal like this. The UK is around 2.5% of US imports so it’s not a big trading relationship.

This article was written by Adam Button at www.forexlive.com.