Hopes of seeing Donald Trump roll back tariffs before they go live were dashed this morning—along with sentiment across global financial markets. The Nikkei is down more than 2%, a Bloomberg index tracking Asian currencies fell to a record low, and European and US futures hint at another very, very ugly trading session, with losses between 2–4% at the time of writing.
I won’t say much about yesterday’s rebound: moves of that magnitude – above 2–3% – aren’t sustainable unless there’s a clear resolution to the tariff problem. China, on the other hand, is seeing limited losses across the CSI 300 companies. Despite being hit by 104% tariffs starting today, Chinese authorities said they will "fight to the end." That likely includes massive and unprecedented measures to keep the economy afloat. Trump’s trade policies continue to weigh on the US dollar, on rising recession bets—the dumbest recession in world history,...
