Tag: International Trade and World Market

The Iran War Permanently Altered the Global Economy

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The framework deal between the United States and Iran sets the stage for an end to the bursts of violence and debilitating disruption of energy deliveries and trade in the Persian Gulf. But don’t expect economies around the globe to simply pick up where they left off before the United States and Israel began bombing Iran on Feb. 28. The war has set in motion changes that will be hard to reverse. The global energy order is being reshaped. The near shutdown in oil and gas deliveries from the Middle…

China Moves the Price of Oil, Even When It Buys Less

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After the war in Iran cut off a fifth of the world’s oil supply, oil prices jumped, at one point reaching nearly $120 a barrel. But they didn’t spike higher, even though some analysts warned ominously of $200 oil, and prices have since come down. At more than $80 a barrel, oil is expensive. But it could be a lot higher. One major reason was China. The biggest oil buyer in the world, China has kept a lid on prices by rapidly reducing the amount of oil it imports. Before…

The World Is Draining Oil Reserves, Raising Pressure for a Peace Deal

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The world is quickly depleting its stores of oil, putting more pressure on President Trump to reach a deal with Iran that would quickly get more fuel flowing out of the Persian Gulf. Vast stockpiles of oil, gasoline and other fuels have helped fill the hole in global energy supplies created by the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran. But those reserves, which companies and governments stash in giant steel storage tanks and underground salt caverns, are running low in some places. This week, U.S. government stockpiles were poised to hit their…

Videos Show Chinese Businesses Hawking North Korean Labor

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Quick deliveries of large orders for stuffed toys, fake eyelashes and crocheted bags that are made with cheap labor, including some workers who are on the job for 16 hours straight. This is the pitch some Chinese businesses are making on social media to potential customers. But the products they are selling are made in North Korea, like in this video of a wig factory. In the posts, which have proliferated in recent years, some Chinese entrepreneurs say that they own factories in North Korea and openly share contact information,…

Trump Aims New Tariffs at 59 Countries and the European Union

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President Trump has proposed tariffs of at least 10 percent on 60 American trading partners, his most aggressive effort yet to enact new import duties after the Supreme Court struck down the administration’s sweeping tariffs. Jamieson Greer, the U.S. trade representative, said on Tuesday night that investigations found that the 59 countries, along with the 27-nation European Union, had failed to enact or effectively enforce laws prohibiting imports made with forced labor. The administration, invoking a legal provision known as Section 301, proposed a 12.5 percent duty on imports from…

Why America Is Its Own Biggest Geopolitical Risk

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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. Over the past month, there have been two dominant stories in American foreign policy. One, of course, is the war with Iran. The other is the much-anticipated summit between President Trump and Xi Jinping of China. If you look closely at both of these stories, you see that our foreign policy has entered into a period of absolute incoherence. Trump said that the point of the war with Iran…

Europe Is Edging Closer to a Trade War With China. Here’s Why.

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Kaja Kallas, the top European Union diplomat, recently suggested that ending the continent’s dependence on China was like trying to cure a disease. “Chemotherapy” might be needed, she said, and it was likely to be painful. The comments were an example of the tone Europe is increasingly taking on China, the second-largest goods trading partner for the 27-nation European Union, after the United States. As Beijing adopts more aggressive trade policies and as imports from China into Europe soar, European leaders and companies are fretting over their reliance on Chinese…

Elon Musk and Other CEOs on Trump’s Trip to China Sought Relief

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The chief executives who accompanied President Trump to a meeting and grand banquet in China last week were seeking to curry favor with both the Trump administration and the Chinese government, keenly aware that the support of either could make or break their businesses. But the delegation — which included executives from Boeing, Apple, Nvidia, Cargill and other firms — arrived in Beijing with a variety of commercial complaints about doing business in China, some of which are public, some of which have not been previously reported. In recent weeks,…

China Confirms It Will Buy 200 Boeing Planes

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The Chinese government on Wednesday sought to draw a line on trade tensions with the United States, saying that both sides had agreed not to raise tariffs further while signaling that it could retaliate if Washington did so again. China also confirmed for the first time that it would buy American beef and Boeing airplanes, two deals that President Trump touted after his summit with China’s leader, Xi Jinping, last week. In a statement on Wednesday, China’s Ministry of Commerce said that Beijing had agreed to buy 200 Boeing planes,…

Here’s the Trade Deal That Trump and Xi Should Have Reached

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With some family gatherings, the best you can hope for is that no one gets drunk and starts a fistfight. Expectations when President Trump and China’s leader, Xi Jinping, met on Thursday and Friday were similarly low — and they were met. Mr. Trump had some warm words about the duo’s “fantastic future” and how the Chinese would buy American goods, but the meeting ended without clear progress toward resolving the two sides’ trade disagreements. The result was like a host saying brightly, “It’s so nice when you all get…