A day after news of the U.S.-China agreement on trade, there were signs of further steps being taken. Speaking in Saudi Arabia on Tuesday (May 13), Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said the agreement had created a mechanism to avoid escalation.He said the U.S. did not want to see a general decoupling of the two countries’ economies.
“What we want is, the U.S. is going to decouple in strategic industries, which we saw during COVID, we had become woefully non-self-sufficient.”
The new agreement set a 90-day pause under which most of the levies recently imposed would be drastically reduced. Among concrete steps, Washington said late Monday it would slash the levies imposed on so-called ‘de minimis’ shipments – low value packages that used to be duty free.
The U.S. had hiked tariffs on the parcels to 120%, but will now bring them back down to 54%. That’s likely to be a boost for online giants like Temu and Shein, which have built their rapid growth on the de minimis provision.However, a minimum flat fee of $100 will remain in place. In a further move, China has removed a ban on airlines taking delivery of Boeing jets.
“What we want is, the U.S. is going to decouple in strategic industries, which we saw during COVID, we had become woefully non-self-sufficient.”
The new agreement set a 90-day pause under which most of the levies recently imposed would be drastically reduced. Among concrete steps, Washington said late Monday it would slash the levies imposed on so-called ‘de minimis’ shipments – low value packages that used to be duty free.
The U.S. had hiked tariffs on the parcels to 120%, but will now bring them back down to 54%. That’s likely to be a boost for online giants like Temu and Shein, which have built their rapid growth on the de minimis provision.However, a minimum flat fee of $100 will remain in place. In a further move, China has removed a ban on airlines taking delivery of Boeing jets.
That’s according to Bloomberg News, which says the move follows the trade agreement. There was no comment on the report from Boeing or Beijing.
Excitement over the trade deal initially lifted global stocks on Tuesday, but some of the optimism later waned, with equities in Shanghai closing broadly flat.
Economists pointed out that the agreement still leaves average tariffs significantly higher than they were before the turmoil began.
Also Read: Defence stocks gain up to 7% after PM Modi says time has come for ‘Made in India’ equipment
(Edited by : Juviraj anchil)
