Asian stock markets plummet as US tariff fallout continues
Asian and Australian stock markets opened with heavy losses on Monday morning as the fallout from Donald Trump’s trade tariffs continues.
Shortly after opening, the Nikkei in Tokyo was down 8 per cent, the Hong Kong stock market was down more than 10 per cent and the Taiwan stock market fell more than 9 percent in the first hours after opening.
The Chinese market lost 4 per cent, while the Australian market dropped 6 per cent within 15 minutes of opening. The Australian dollar fell below 0.60 US dollar, its lowest level since April 2020.
The falls are in response to the import tariffs that US president Trump announced last week, which threaten to disrupt international trade. Investors fear the move will lead to higher prices, weaker demand and potentially a global recession.
Trump told reporters in Sunday night that “sometimes you have to take medicine to fix something”. “What's going to happen to the markets I can’t tell you. But our country is much stronger,” he said.
He added that he had spoken to European and Asian leaders and they were “dying to make a deal”.
"Sometimes you have to take medicine to fix something"
US customs agents began collecting the unilateral 10 per cent tariff on imports from many countries on Saturday. Higher “reciprocal” rates of up to 54 per cent on individual countries are due to take effect on Wednesday. The rate for goods from the EU is set at 20 per cent.
Hedge fund manager Bill Ackman, who endorsed Trump's run for president, has said the tariffs could lead the world into a “self-induced economic nuclear winter” and called for a 90-day pause on the taxes.
China is imposing a retaliatory tariff of 34 per cent on all US goods.
Meanwhile, China has rejected a deal to sell TikTok due to the tariffs, Trump said on Sunday. TikTok’s Chinese parent company, ByteDance, had been given until 5 April to sell its American operations or face a ban on the popular video app in the US. The US fears the data of American users is being misused by Chinese officials. On Friday, Trump extended the deadline again.
“If I gave a little cut in tariffs, they’d approve that deal in 15 minutes, which shows you the power of tariffs,” he told reporters.
Both ByteDance and the Chinese authorities must give the green light for the sale. “ByteDance is in talks with the US government about a possible solution for TikTok USA. No agreement has been reached,” the company said in a statement. “There are important issues that need to be resolved.”
People walk across a foot bridge with a stocks indicator board in the financial district of Shanghai, 7 April 2025 © PHOTO HECTOR RETAMAL / AFP
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