Donald Trump’s threat of punitive taxes the total of 505 billion dollars of chinese goods imported (Photo Brendan Smialowski. AFP)
Donald Trump has launched Friday, in a new escalation on trade, accusing China and the european Union to manipulate their respective currency and threatening Beijing of taxing all its exports to the United States.
“China, the european Union and others manipulate their currencies by lowering interest rates so that the United States increase their rate with the dollar becoming stronger and stronger, day after day, which lowers our competitiveness,” said the american president in a tweet, criticizing too harshly the monetary policy of the american central Bank.
“As usual, this is not fair,” he added, while the chinese currency is at its lowest level in over a year.
Since April, the yuan, ticket red with the effigy of Mao Tse-tung, has lost nearly 8% of its value against the dollar, benefiting the export of the chinese goods on the american market, and thus allowing to offset in part the punitive taxes in the us.
The dollar has regained strength against the euro since April. It was as well Friday around 1.17 to the dollar to buy one euro against 1,23 dollar in April.
In another tweet aimed at the Fed, Donald Trump stated that “the United States should not be penalized because they are going very well. Tighten (monetary policy) done them wrong now all that we have done,” he wrote, in reference to a thriving economy boosted by the tax reform, which greatly reduced taxes for households and businesses.
The ECB has not reacted, the Fed no longer refers to the comments of the last month of its chairman, Jerome Powell defending the independence of the institution.
The Fed, which has begun an exit from the monetary policy at the zero interest rate two years ago, provides for gradual raising its key rate twice this year to be close to 2.50% instead of 2% today, to control inflation and avoid overheating after the stimulus, huge budget that promotes, among other things, the increase in price.
Earlier, Donald Trump had taken in Beijing, stating that it was ready to impose punitive taxes on all chinese imports.
“I’m ready to go up to 500”, he said on the television channel CNBC, referring to the 505,5 billion dollars of chinese goods imported by the United States in 2017. “I’m not doing this for political purposes, I do to do what is good for our country,” he assured, accusing China of”ripped off” for a long time the United States.
The american president, who accuse Beijing of practices that are “unfair” and “theft of intellectual property”, requires the asian giant to reduce the u.s. deficit of $ 200 billion.
But after a truce of short duration in the spring, the White House has implemented on July 6, the customs and excise duties additional 25% on $ 34 billion of chinese imports. Sixteen billion dollars of imports must be in addition to soon to be taxed.
– “More great trade war” –
The chinese authorities, who denounced acts “irrational” of the american president, believe that Washington has triggered “the greatest trade war in economic history”.
“I really like president Xi (Jinping). But it is very unfair,” insisted Donald Trump.
Mid-April, the u.s. Treasury found that China is not manipulating, not his money, but had placed under surveillance the country as well as South Korea, Germany, Japan, Switzerland and India.
Economists worry about the trade policy of aggressive United States.
This week, the international monetary Fund (IMF) has certainly maintained its forecast for global growth to 3.9% for 2018 and 2019, but its director general, Christine Lagarde, pointed out that it was probably a peak.
And Maurice Obstfeld, chief economist of the Fund, was also of the view that the trade tensions as “the threat, the greater short-term for global growth”.
So much so that the White House is engaged in a trade conflict not only with Beijing but also with its main partners such as the european Union, Canada or Mexico.
The administration Trump is considering including punitive taxes on the strategic sector of the automobile, raising serious concerns abroad as in the United States, where industrial and trade unions fear massive job cuts.
The president of the european Commission, Jean-Claude Juncker, will meet with Donald Trump on the 25 July in the federal capital to try to defuse the trade dispute.
