Officials vow to stay course as countries scramble

US President Donald Trump and his advisers have defended sweeping tariffs on imports and vowed to remain the course, regardless of market turmoil and calls to keep away from a commerce battle.

In a sequence of tv interviews, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent performed down latest inventory market falls and Howard Lutnick, the commerce secretary, insisted reciprocal tariffs could be applied as deliberate.

Bessent stated there was “no cause” to anticipate a recession on account of the turmoil. “That is an adjustment course of,” he stated.

In the meantime, one other prime adviser, Kevin Hassett, stated greater than 50 nations have contacted Trump to attempt to negotiate a deal.

All three main inventory indexes within the US plunged greater than 5% on Friday, whereas the S&P 500 dropped nearly 6% in the worst week for the US stock market since 2020.

In an indication market fragility might proceed this week, Saudi Arabia’s inventory alternate – which trades on Sundays – ended practically 7% decrease, its largest each day loss for the reason that pandemic, state-owned media stated.

US banking large JP Morgan has predicted a 60% likelihood of a US and world recession following Trump’s tariffs announcement.

Talking to reporters aboard Air Power One on Sunday night, Trump stated European and Asian nations are “dying to make a deal”.

He additionally pushed again in opposition to a reporter’s inquiry about American customers’ “ache threshold” as fears of steep value will increase and a market recession develop.

“I feel your query is so silly,” he informed the reporter. “I do not need something to go down. However generally you need to take drugs to repair one thing.”

Challenged in regards to the turmoil, Lutnick informed CBS Information on Sunday that the ten% “baseline” tariff on all imports, which got here into impact a day earlier, will certainly “keep in place for days and weeks”.

Lutnick went on say the steeper reciprocal tariffs had been nonetheless on monitor.

Increased customized tariffs on roughly 60 nations, dubbed the “worst offenders”, are attributable to come into impact on Wednesday 9 April.

When requested about these tariffs, Lutnick stated they had been coming. “[Trump] introduced it and he wasn’t kidding,” he stated.

Lutnick additionally defended tariffs imposed on two tiny Antarctic islands populated solely by penguins, saying it was to shut “loopholes” for nations comparable to China to “ship by”.

Bessent used an interview with Meet the Press on NBC to argue Trump had “created most leverage for himself, and greater than 50 nations have approached the administration about decreasing their non-tariff commerce limitations, decreasing their tariffs, stopping foreign money manipulation”.

Kevin Hassett, one other prime financial adviser to Trump, additionally repeated the declare that greater than 50 nations had expressed a need to start negotiations. Neither Hassett nor Bessent gave additional particulars of which nations had been in contact.

Elsewhere, Indonesia and Taiwan have stated over the weekend that they won’t impose retaliatory tariffs after the US introduced a 32% levy on imports from each nations.

Vietnam’s chief, To Lam, has requested Trump to delay a 46% responsibility on Vietnamese exports to the US by “at the very least 45 days”, in keeping with a letter seen by information company AFP and the New York Occasions.

Nonetheless, China introduced on Friday that it will impose a 34% tariff on all US imports, starting on Thursday 10 April.

UK Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer warned on Saturday that “the world as we knew it has gone”.

Starmer stated the UK authorities will maintain pushing for an financial take care of the US that avoids a number of the tariffs.

A Downing Road spokesman added Starmer and new Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney agreed in a telephone name that “an all-out commerce battle is in no-one’s curiosity”.

On Monday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is anticipated to fulfill Trump for commerce talks in Washington DC.

Netanyahu, talking to reporters as he boarded a plane-bound for the US, stated he’s “the primary worldwide chief that’s assembly with Trump” for the reason that new tariffs had been launched.

He says this reveals their “private connection and the connection between our nations that’s so important on this time”.

Anti-Trump protests had been held in cities throughout the US over the weekend, within the largest nationwide present of opposition for the reason that president took workplace in January.

Tons of of 1000’s of individuals turned out in Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, New York and Washington DC, amongst different cities, with protesters citing grievances with Trump’s agenda starting from social to financial points.

Trump has urged the US to “dangle powerful” after the market turmoil.