Signal April 2025 US tariffs: universal launch, 90-day pause for partners and over 104 percent on China

Summary

The report traces the sequence of the reciprocal and universal tariffs that the second Trump administration announced on 2 April 2025. Tariffs were first declared against the whole world to state the America-first principle, after which priority negotiating partners centred on allies were chosen and granted a 90-day pause to stress burden sharing. China, by contrast, received no pause and was hit with the highest rate, above 104 percent, as a signal that the new order must be accepted. The authors read this as a Trump-style bargaining method in which powers with weight are handled bilaterally while other countries are grouped and given common rules. They add that regardless of final rates the tariffs are likely to force changes in global supply and value chains already under pressure since the pandemic.