The Trump administration’s inability to make up its mind with regard to Section 232 tariffs is making it very hard to do business, sources note, adding that the current landscape, which involves Donald Trump “changing his mind on a daily basis” is causing its fair share of problems.
In the past month, Trump announced a blanket 25 percent tariff on all steel imports to the US, but reversed course several days later, saying that Canada and Mexico would receive a temporary exemption while NAFTA renegotiations continued. A few days after that, Trump announced that four countries plus the EU would also receive exemptions, but within 24 hours, it was announced the exemptions would expire on May 1.
The next announcement indicated that South Korea—granted a temporary exemption along with Australia, Argentina, and Brazil—would receive a permanent exemption but the country would need to reduce steel exports to the US by 30 percent, but less than a week later, during a campaign speech, Trump said there was a chance he would rip that deal up altogether. Most recently, over the weekend, Trump threatened to end the NAFTA agreement with Mexico due to an immigration spat.
“We just keep doing nothing. We can’t buy, because we don’t now what the price is going to be, and the offshore mills can’t quote, because they don’t know what their price is going to be. No one has any idea what’s going on,” another source said. “It’s commercial paralysis.”
Another Texas-based source expressed frustration at Trump trade adviser Peter Navarro. “This guy has no sense of reality,” he said.
Current import J55 ERW OCTG casing pricing from Taiwan is currently being heard at $50.00-$51.25 ($1102-$1130/mt or $1000-$1025), DDP loaded truck in US Gulf coast ports, but sellers are indicating to their customers that all prices are subject to change based on the whims of the Trump administration.