Who’s profitable underneath Trump’s tariff coverage? | EUROtoday

On April 2, 2025, Donald Trump shocked the world by saying “economic independence” for the US, imposing sweeping tariffs on each nation on the planet. The US Supreme Court has since dominated in opposition to the unprecedented transfer, however the US president appears eager to double down.

DW analyzed commerce knowledge on the origin of US imports over the previous 12 months to search out out: What have Trump’s tariffs achieved? How is the remainder of the world adjusting to this new financial order? And who, if anybody, is reaping the advantages?

April 2, 2025: White House declares ‘Liberation Day’ tariffs

Under the “Liberation Day” tariffs, the White House introduced that each nation — with just a few exemptions as a consequence of sanctions and pre-existing commerce offers — can be topic to a ten% baseline tariff on all items they export to the US. Additionally, 85 international locations that export extra to the US than they import can be topic to greater tariffs of as much as 50%.

“I don’t think people expected the US administration to essentially declare a trade war on the entire world,” says Haishi Li, economist at Hong Kong University whose analysis focuses on how tariffs and sanctions impression international commerce.

Chaos broke out instantly, and international inventory markets plummeted. While Trump insisted publicly that “big business is not worried about the tariffs,” he introduced a 90-day pause of all tariffs exceeding the baseline 10% charge on April 9.

During this pause, many buying and selling companions such because the European Union, Vietnam and the United Kingdom unexpectedly negotiated commerce offers within the hope of bringing down the introduced tariff charges. Negotiations with China remained tumultuous over the following few months, with rounds of tit-for-tat tariffs reaching as much as 125%.

After a number of last-minute extensions to the 90-day tariff pause, country-specific charges lastly got here into impact on August 7, 2025.

Early 2025: US importers stockpile in expectation of tariffs

Even earlier than April, it was clear that adjustments had been coming. “Tariffs are going to make us rich as hell,” Trump introduced upon coming into his second time period in January 2025.

US corporations understood the message: Racing to fill warehouses earlier than prices elevated, they dramatically boosted their ordersbringing roughly 20% extra items into the nation between January and March than the 2022–2024 common — equal to a plus of round $184 billion.

Anticipating greater tariffs on gold bullion, as an illustration, the US imported roughly 50 instances its standard quantity in early 2025, totaling round $72 billion — largely from Switzerland, but in addition from an eclectic combine of recent or uncommon suppliers, together with Uzbekistan, the Philippines, and Zimbabwe.

Big producers throughout Asia additionally noticed sharp will increase, with Taiwan, Vietnam, and India all recording extra exports to the US than standard.

April to July 2025: US corporations shift to lower-tariff international locations

The suspension interval applied on April 9 meant US importers had a three-month window through which to regulate to the brand new state of affairs.

A research by Haishi Li and colleagues discovered that, overwhelmingly, corporations tried to shift their provide chains to international locations with decrease tariff charges. “Imports were like water, flowing from high-tariff countries to low-tariff countries,” Li informed DW.

And from no different nation did US imports shift away greater than from China, which confronted by far the very best, and most risky, tariff threats of any. The US imported items value $66 billion much less from China between April and July 2025 than throughout the identical interval in earlier years.

Canada, which was individually threatened with tariffs of 25%, additionally noticed a major drop in its exports to the US, to the tune of $24 billion. However, the nation seems to have efficiently compensated for this drop by adjusting its commerce with different international locations: Canada’s general exports in 2025 had been solely $1.6 billion decrease in comparison with 2024

“The countries that benefited most from the tariff threat were the ‘10% countries,’ such as Australia and Latin America countries,” stated Li.

But some high-tariff international locations additionally noticed large import surges from US corporations: Vietnam, Thailand and Taiwan confronted a number of the steepest “reciprocal tariffs” — 46%, 36%, and 34% respectively — but the US recorded an extra $34 billion in imports from Taiwan alone between April and July.

“US importers tended to import from countries that were potential substitutes for China,” Li stated. Many producers in Taiwan and Vietnam already had sturdy ties with US corporations, bolstered throughout Trump’s first-term commerce dispute with China, which pushed manufacturing and provide chains towards these and different Asian economies.

US residents bear the brunt of tariff prices

So far, the tariffs haven’t introduced manufacturing again to the US, says Alex Durante, senior economist on the US-based assume tank Tax Foundation, which has tracked the home impression of the tariffs. “This past year has been quite bad for manufacturing and employment,” he informed DW. “In fact, the sectors that are growing tend to be ones relatively insulated from the tariffs because of exemptions like computers and AI-related products.”

And whereas US importers shifted the place they purchased from, the full worth of imports returned to regular quickly after the “Liberation Day” announcement on April 2.

One determine that has risen sharply is US customs income. In 2025, the US Treasury collected $287 billion in customs duties and associated taxes — roughly triple the quantity in earlier years. Early knowledge suggests 2026 is on observe to surpass even that complete.

This income made up round 5% of all taxes collected within the US in 2025. Recent research present that the upper tariffs have been nearly totally paid by US importers, not international exporters.

As a consequence, US shoppers have ended up bearing the brunt of the burden. “We estimated that the tariffs have effectively cost each US household around $1,000 in 2025,” stated Durante. “This is the cumulative effect of businesses having to raise prices, cut investment, cut employment, or reduce wages to adjust to the tariffs.”

Uncertainty plagues worldwide exporters

Internationally, the months since August 2025 have been marked by unexpectedly brokered — and shortly unraveled — commerce offers, alongside recent rounds of tariff threats aimed toward particular person international locations or product teams.

Global commerce, economist Li says, has turn out to be much more unsure: “If you ask academics, US policy makers, anyone, what will happen this year — I don’t think anyone knows.”

The most up-to-date shock to the precarious new regular of the US tariff panorama got here within the type of February’s Supreme Court ruling which struck down the authorized foundation of Trump’s authentic “Liberation Day” tariffs. With a brand new 15% blanket tariff charge in place, and the US administration seemingly decided to search out different methods to levy greater duties once more, exporters and importers alike are left guessing what the approaching months might deliver.

To adapt to this uncertainty, Li says governments might give attention to supporting corporations to discover new markets exterior of the US. “If they can diversify their supply chains, it will make them more resilient, which might be a silver lining.”

Edited by: Gianna Grün and Andreas Becker

Data, code and methodology behind this story will be discovered on this github repository.

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