The world’s biggest economies reacted swiftly on Thursday to President Trump’s latest round of tariffs, warning of retaliation against what they described as a counterproductive move.

 

Ana SwansonAlan Rappeport and Tony Romm

https://www.nytimes.com/live/2025/04/03/business/trump-tariffs

 

Here’s the latest.

The world’s biggest economies reacted swiftly on Thursday to President Trump’s latest round of tariffs, warning of retaliation against what they described as a counterproductive move.

 

As markets in Asia dropped sharply on Thursday in response to the tariffs, China vowed to take countermeasures to “safeguard its own rights and interests.” Its state media described the tariffs as “self-defeating bullying.”

 

In Brussels, Ursula von der Leyen, the European Commission president, said in an early morning news conference that the bloc would be united in its response to the tariffs.

 

“If you take on one of us, you take on all of us,” she said.

 

The response from Japan, the largest overseas investor in the United States, was more restrained. Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba called the tariffs “extremely regrettable.” But he refrained from talk of retaliation, saying that his government was trying to impress upon the Trump administration that Japan is helping the United States to industrialize again.

 

Mr. Trump’s move, a significant escalation, is likely to drive up prices for American consumers and manufacturers. While he had said for weeks that he would impose “reciprocal tariffs,” the specifics went far beyond what many experts had expected.

 

Business groups, trade experts, economists, Democratic and even a few Republican lawmakers swiftly denounced the tariffs, while some industries scrambled to understand how they would be affected.

 

Mr. Trump framed his policies as a response to a national emergency, saying that tariffs were needed to boost domestic production. Others in the United States were less enthusiastic about what lay ahead.

 

Mr. Trump could have tried to fix the rules governing global trade, which he says allies have abused to the detriment of the U.S. economy and American consumers, said Eswar Prasad, a professor of trade policy at Cornell University.

 

Instead, he said, “Trump has chosen to blow up the system governing international trade.”

 

Here’s what else to know:

 

Steep rates: The United States will subject Chinese goods to a staggering new tariff of 34 percent, on top of the tariffs that Mr. Trump had already imposed since January. The European Union’s tariff was set at 20 percent, Japan’s at 24 percent and India’s at 26 percent. Mr. Trump said little about the methodology behind those calculations.

 

Markets fall: The initial market reaction suggested that the scale of the tariffs had come as a surprise. Futures on the S&P 500 slumped over 3 percent, as benchmark indexes in Asia dropped more than 3 percent in Japan and nearly 2 percent in Hong Kong and South Korea.

 

China’s response: The country’s Commerce Ministry said the new U.S. tariffs were “based on subjective and unilateral assessments,” and described them as “unilateral bullying.” The tariffs have likely dimmed hope of a meeting between the country’s top leader, Xi Jinping, and Mr. Trump, who has expressed interest in a summit.

 

Auto tariffs: New tariffs on all automobiles made outside the United States took effect, adding to previous tariffs on steel, aluminum and other imports that Mr. Trump has imposed since returning to office in January.