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Trump’s team offers mixed messaging on tariff negotiation, downplays market volatility Top Trump administration officials are offering mixed messaging on the possibility of negotiations on the president’s newly announced tariffs , downplaying severe market volatility . US President Donald Trump has left the door open to cutting tariff deals with countries. But messaging from his top economic lieutenants Sunday painted a murkier picture.
More than 50 countries – including Vietnam, India and Israel – have approached the White House to talk about lowering tariffs, officials said Sunday. That outreach, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick told CBS News’ “Face the Nation,” shows “that all these countries know that they’ve been ripping us off, and the day has come for that to end.” But asked about the example of Vietnam and the potential lifting of tariffs, Trump’s senior counselor on trade and manufacturing, Peter Navarro, said earlier on Sunday that the administration wasn’t negotiating.
“This is not a negotiation. This is a national emergency based on a trade deficit that’s gotten out of control because of cheating. We’re always willing to listen, that’s what Donald Trump does best,” he told Fox News’ “Sunday Morning Futures.
” Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins also could not say whether tariffs are here to stay. “This is the ultimate dealmaker who is a businessman at the head of our government. .
.. But the president is resolute in his focus and his boldness and his fearlessness and in his relentlessness to ensure that we’re putting America first by using these tariffs,” she told CNN’s Jake Tapper on “State of the Union.
” Musk hopes for "zero-tariff situation" between US and EU Elon Musk , the world’s richest man and a key aide to US President Donald Trump, said Saturday that he hopes for a “zero-tariff situation” between Europe and the United Statea. Musk’s comments – in a video interview Saturday with Italy’s far-right Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini – are the strongest sign of splits within the Trump administration over the president’s tariff announcement that sparked a global market rout. “At the end of the day, I hope it’s agreed that both Europe and the United States should move ideally, in my view, to a zero-tariff situation, effectively creating a free-trade zone between Europe and North America,” Musk said, in contrast to the trade policy of the US president he helped elect.
Musk has seen Tesla sales plunge in recent months amid his controversial cost-cutting role with the so-called Department of Government Efficiency. Sales fell 49% in Europe alone in the first two months of the quarter, according to the European Automobile Manufacturers’ Association . Musk’s comments come as questions swirl about his future in the White House.
Last week, Politico reported – citing MAGA insiders – that Musk had overstayed his welcome in Washington and could be ousted within weeks. The White House called the Politico report “garbage” and Musk dismissed it as “fake news.” Global markets plunge: Trump’s tariff turmoil sends European and Asian stocks into tailspin Global markets plunged on Monday, deepening a global stocks rout triggered by US President Donald Trump’s trade war and China’s forceful response to unexpectedly high tariffs.
Germany’s Dax opened down 9%, while London’s FTSE was about 5% lower. European markets were, on the whole, faring better than Asian markets in early trade. Japan’s benchmark Nikkei 225 index closed 7.
9% lower, while the broader Topix finished down 7.7%. Tech giant Sony plummeted more than 10%.
In mainland China, where markets reopened after a public holiday, the Shanghai Composite Index closed more than 7% lower. The blue-chip CSI300 index also lost about 7%. In Hong Kong, the benchmark Hang Seng index last traded just under 12% lower.
Chinese tech giants Alibaba and Tencent were each down more than 14% and 10% respectively. Trading volumes in Hong Kong surged on Monday, which she said was “a clear sign of widespread forced liquidations and what can only be described as a full-blown panic.” Asian markets are tracking the worst two-day stretch for Wall Street stocks in five years.
US stock futures plunged Sunday evening after two sessions of sell-offs that wiped away over $5.4 trillion in market value. US stocks fell sharply on Friday after China retaliated fiercely , imposing a 34% tariff on all US goods, raising fears of an escalating and damaging trade war fueled by continuing trade tension between the world’s two largest economies.
Read the full story here Trump shrugs off tariff fallout as "medicine" Despite his tariffs wiping away trillions from the market value of global stocks, US President Donald Trump appeared untroubled late Sunday evening. “I don’t want anything to go down. But sometimes you have to take medicine to fix something,” Trump told reporters on Air Force One.
In his “Liberation Day” announcement last week, Trump claimed that the US has been “ripped off for more than 50 years,” saying this is “not going to happen anymore.” Although Trump’s tariffs were billed as “reciprocal,” the levies were calculated to punish countries like Vietnam and Cambodia with whom the US has large trade deficits..
