Lower US lobster tariffs ‘unlikely’ says former Chinese trade official – Global Times

While offering fresh clues of the Sino-American trade tussle, China’s Global Times said, relying on the ex-trade official, the Asian major is unlikely to lower tariffs on US lobsters, part of its countermeasures against US tariff hikes unless the trade dispute initiator moves first on tariff rollbacks.

Key quotes

US President Donald Trump threatened the EU and China with more tariffs at a roundtable event in the US northeastern state of Maine with local fishermen on Friday, according to Bloomberg, in hopes of intimidating the trading partners into reducing tariffs on US lobsters. 

White House trade adviser Peter Navarro, named the “lobster king,” was put in charge of talks, according to US media reports.

EU-made cars were targeted in Trump’s latest tariff threats that also eye unspecified Chinese products, which according to Trump were “something they sell that’s very precious to them,” according to the Bloomberg report.

China’s imposition of a 25-percent tariff on US lobster imports was a retaliatory countermeasure against the US’ imposing higher tariffs on Chinese imports.

FX implications

Although the news should have ideally weighed on the market’s risk-tone sentiment, S&P 500 Futures gain 0.50% to 3,201 by the press time of early Monday morning in Asia. The reason could be traced from the market’s optimism after Friday’s upbeat US jobs report.