Global stock markets were steady on Tuesday as investors awaited the next moves from Donald Trump, after the US president announced tariff rates for more than a dozen of the US’s trading partners.
The US president on Monday sent letters to 14 trading partners, including Japan and South Korea, setting out the tariffs that would come into effect on August 1. The White House has said more letters will be sent this week.
Speaking late on Monday, Trump also left the door open for negotiations, saying that the letters were “more or less” final offers, and “not 100 per cent firm”.
This week’s move comes after a 90-day pause on the so-called reciprocal tariffs announced by Trump on ‘liberation day’ was set to end on July 9.
Investors were “taking the view that nothing is final and that these letters merely mark another iteration on the journey towards trade deals”, analysts at ING noted.
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In Europe, the Stoxx Europe 600 was flat and the FTSE 100 edged up 0.1 per cent in early trading.
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Futures tracking the S&P 500 rose 0.1 per cent.
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In Asia, Japan’s Topix closed up 0.2 per cent and South Korea’s Kospi rose 2 per cent.
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The US dollar index, which tracks the US currency against a basket of peer currencies, was down 0.2 per cent.
