Tag: International Trade and World Market

China’s Export Boom Rolls On Despite Trade Backlash

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Another month, another trade surplus of more than $100 billion for China. Even as countries around the world move to curb the flood of Chinese goods, China’s export machine continues to steam ahead. The country posted a trade surplus of $112.5 billion in July, according to data released Friday by the General Administration of Customs. It was the third straight month in which China’s exports exceeded its imports by more than $100 billion — a staggering sum that puts the country on pace to surpass last year’s record $1.19 trillion…

The German Auto Industry, a Pillar of the National Psyche, Is Trembling

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The centerpiece of Mercedes-Benz’s 140th birthday party in January was a patent application filed in 1886 by an engineer named Carl Benz for a “vehicle with gas engine.” The way Mercedes executives spoke of the handwritten document, which at one point was projected on a large wall on the company campus in Stuttgart, Germany, it might have been a sacred parchment. It not only certifies that Germany is the birthplace of the automobile but also helps explain why the woes of the country’s automakers — Volkswagen, Mercedes and BMW —…

This Is How America Trounces China in the A.I. Race

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The Chinese government has spent three years giving away its most capable artificial intelligence to anyone to use. That generosity was always temporary. Chinese authorities have reportedly been meeting with Alibaba, ByteDance and the start-up Z.ai to discuss restricting overseas access to some of China’s most advanced models — including systems that have not yet been released. The U.S. government’s instinct will likely be to answer with a ban of its own. That would be a mistake. The right response is the opposite: America and its allies should build and…

Trump Prepares Yet Another Strategy to Resurrect Global Tariffs

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The Trump administration has cycled through trade law after trade law as it tries to find a sound legal basis to impose the steep tariffs on foreign products that President Trump wants. It is poised to try yet another approach. A global 10 percent tariff that Mr. Trump imposed in February after the Supreme Court struck down his earlier global tariffs is set to lapse at 12:01 a.m. on Friday. The administration has a new batch of tariffs ready to go to replace it, which could be announced as soon…

Tariffs Will Long Outlive Trump

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Donald Trump’s most consequential construction project may not be a ballroom or an arch, but his tariff wall. His latest threat to raise tariffs to 50 percent on some Canadian goods, as drastic as it is, is not nearly as significant as what’s coming next. By the end of this month, the administration is expected to introduce major tariffs on dozens of countries intended to ensure what once was a temporary regime lasts well beyond this presidency. Unlike most previous rounds of tariffs, including the ones just threatened on Canada,…

Russia Bill Broadens Sanctions but Could Fuel Fears Over the Dollar

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A Russia sanctions bill is posing a dilemma for the Trump administration: Lawmakers are pushing to wage further financial warfare just as the administration worries that heavy use of sanctions may erode the U.S. dollar’s supremacy. The bill, which was the brainchild of Senator Lindsey Graham before his death, aims to impose mandatory sanctions on Russia and its allies and potentially broaden the reach of penalties to include tariffs on buyers of Russian energy. The White House has said that the scope of the sanctions could broaden to include Iran…

The Quest for ‘Technological Sovereignty’ in Europe (and Why It’s So Hard)

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The French government said this year that it would replace Zoom and other American videoconference software with a French-developed alternative. Germany is building a homegrown platform for artificial intelligence. Companies in both countries are teaming up to build A.I. chips to rival those of the United States and China. These are modest steps in Europe’s high-stakes race to catch up to America and China in the global sprint for digital independence. Without it, Europe’s political and business leaders worry, they will be vulnerable to sudden losses of access to critical…

What Americans Need to Understand About China

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This is an edited transcript of “The Ezra Klein Show.” You can listen to the episode wherever you get your podcasts. Since 2012, Xi Jinping has been the leader of the Chinese Communist Party. He has consolidated power to a level very few people ever expected, and under his rule, China has strengthened technologically, diplomatically and militarily. It is now widely understood to be an industrial juggernaut on a scale the world has never seen, in a way the world does not quite know how to respond to. But Xi’s…

Trump Paid $2 Million by South Korean Company Facing Trade Investigation

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The lead investor in a South Korean aluminum company that has challenged Commerce Department penalties on certain exports from South Korea to the United States made a $2 million payment last year to President Trump’s holding company. The payment by the parent company, Base Group, was revealed for the first time in Mr. Trump’s annual financial disclosure form released in late June. The document offered only a cryptic explanation for the payment, stating that it was part of a “letter of intent” and a “nonrefundable development fee.” In statements to…

Shippers Face Deepening Dilemma as U.S. and Iran Vie for Control of the Strait

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Harry Vafias, a chief executive of a shipping company, recently got one of his vessels out of the Persian Gulf on a route protected by the U.S. military. But after Iran and the United States attacked each other this week, all but ending the truce the countries agreed to last month, Mr. Vafias, the head of StealthGas, based in Athens, said he was holding off on moving another ship through the Strait of Hormuz. “Things are becoming uglier by the minute,” he said in an email, “so we are not…