Wall Street fell on the open today as Donald Trump’s new 125% tariffs on China dented recovery after he paused higher levies on almost all other countries. Listen to Trump 100 – on the trade war between China and the US – as you scroll.
Thursday 10 April 2025 15:50, UK
Live reporting by Mark Wyatt
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Donald Trump’s decision to pause his tariffs for 90 days was born from him realising he’d made a grave mistake.
That’s according to Thomas Gift, director of the centre on US politics at University College London. He tells presenter Gareth Barlow he thinks Trump was also under pressure from Republicans concerned over what impact tariffs could have on next year’s midterms.
“A lot of his backers in the White House had said that this was his play all along, and that he was essentially playing four dimensional chess while everybody else was playing checkers,” Gift says.
“I absolutely don’t think that that is the case. I think Donald Trump realised that he made a mistake.
“He was swayed ultimately by sharp drops in the stock market, by business leaders expressing doubts about his policies and then especially Republicans in Congress coming to him and saying this is not helping, especially looking ahead to the 2026 midterms.
“He could also just look at public opinion. Americans are not in favour of these tariffs. And I think as he saw his support drop further and further and further, he ultimately decided that he didn’t have any other course except to reverse these tariffs.”
What happens at the end of 90 days?
Gift says this depends a lot on which vices Trump is listening to in the White House.
“There are voices within the White House that are, you could say, more sane, more conservative – sort of understand the balance that is so delicate in the international trade system.
“I think Scott Bessent, who is the treasury secretary, really has been leaning on Donald Trump not to go and follow his impulses here. I think he was probably ultimately the voice of reason and led Trump to reverse these tariffs.”
But Gift says one thing we know of Trump is that he is “unpredictable, volatile and impulsive”.
“I certainly wouldn’t count out the possibility of him putting these tariffs back on.”
By Peter Nicholas, Garrett Haake and Carol E Lee, NBC News
“Liberation Day” just gave way to Capitulation Day.
US President Donald Trump pulled back yesterday on a series of harsh tariffs targeting friends and foes alike in an audacious bid to remake the global economic order.
Trump’s early afternoon announcement followed a harrowing week in which Republican lawmakers and confidants privately warned him that the tariffs could wreck the economy.
His own aides had quietly raised alarms about the financial markets before he suspended a tariff regime that he had unveiled with a flourish just one week earlier in a Rose Garden ceremony.
The stock market rose immediately after the about-face, ending days of losses that have forced older Americans who’ve been sinking their savings into 401(k)s to rethink their retirement plans.
So, how did Trump’s reversal come about? Tap the link below to find out more…
The EU might have seen its Trump tariffs reduced in the last 24 hours, but concern still remains for what happens at the end of the 90-day pause.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said today the bloc was pausing its retaliatory tariffs on the US for 90 days in response to Trump’s own pause and wants to give negotiations a chance.
“The concern for investors across Europe and around the world is that this 90-day reprieve is just a 90-day reprieve,” international affairs editor Dominic Waghorn says.
“Trump has been talking about medicine being applied to the American economy. This is just an operation that’s simply been postponed.”
“I think investors have had some encouragement from the Europeans, but they’ll know that if it continues like this, then Trump could reapply those tariffs in 90 days, and we could be back to where we were in the last few days.”
What’s the mood in Beijing?
Waghorn says China possibly sees this as the moment when it can complete its “destiny of toppling a global hegemon” and “getting rid of the liberal order that America created very much on its own after World War Two, something the Chinese have always really resented.”
“They have looked for an opportunity to replace America as the strongest power in the world,” he adds.
He says Trump’s tariff wars will be helping them push the message that the Chinese, not the Americans, are the “stable, predictable ones” and that investors “can’t rely on Americans”.
Rather than commenting on the US stock market after it bucked the global trend by opening down a moment ago, Donald Trump has instead just shared a more positive message on Truth Social.
The president gave a blunt reaction to the news that US inflation fell more than expected in March…
By Sarah Taaffe-Maguire, business and economics reporter
There were hopes of a US stock market surge like we’ve seen across Europe and Asia. They’ve now been dashed.
All three of Wall Street’s main stock indexes have opened down.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average index of 30 major companies listed on US stock exchanges dropped 1.6%, even more than the open yesterday.
The S&P 500 index of companies, often relied on to be stable and profitable, lost 2.3%.
The tech-heavy Nasdaq was down nearly 3%.
However, it’s worth noting the massive gains recorded yesterday. The Dow Jones had its best day since 2020. The Nasdaq had the highest increase since 2001. For the S&P, it was the best daily performance since 2008.
A reminder: figures can fluctuate almost by the second, but we will bring you any major developments.
We’ve been keeping a close eye on the stock markets since Donald Trump announced a 90-day pause on his tariffs last night – a week after his so-called “Liberation Day”.
Markets in Asia, Europe and the UK have opened positively today – and in a few minutes, at 2.30pm UK time, we’ll know the fate of Wall Street after stocks surged before the close last night after Trump’s announcement. They’re expected to open down because of the escalating US-China trade war.
Watch the moment the New York Stock Exchange begins trading here – and we’ll bring you the opening numbers as soon as they’ve settled.
India wants to move quickly on a trade deal with the US, a government official has said.
Speaking on condition of anonymity, the official told Reuters, has said: “India is one of the first nations to start talks over a deal with the US and to have jointly agreed to a deadline to conclude it.”
In February, India and the US agreed to work on the first phase of a trade deal to be concluded late this year, with a view to reaching two-way trade worth $500bn by 2030.
After Trump’s reversal yesterday, India is on the baseline 10% tariff, down from the 27% imposed on “liberation day”.
The figures are just in and US inflation has fallen more than expected in March.
Data from the US Bureau of Labor Statistics shows the annual inflation rate in the US eased more than expected, to 2.4%, in March.
Economists had expected it to ease to 2.6%.
Inflation was 2.8% in February, which is down from 3% in January.
Donald Trump was defiant in the face of stock market turmoil, but when it spread to the bond market, he started to get nervous.
Even his economic adviser has admitted the bond turmoil “contributed” to his decision to bring in a 90-day pause for most of his higher worldwide tariffs (see our previous post).
There was good news on the stock markets yesterday, after the pause was announced.
The Nasdaq Composite, which was hammered the hardest by the president’s levies, jumped 12.16% within seconds of Trump’s pause – its largest jump in 24 years.
Business and economic correspondent Gurpreet Narwan explains there are still signs of trouble, though, despite the change of course…
A “big inventory” of tariff deals with countries around the world are “close to the line”, White House economic adviser Kevin Hassett says.
Speaking to CNBC just now, Hassett admitted that the crashing bond market “may have contributed to the tariff decision” but insisted Trump’s reversal “was not a panic move”.
In a further interview with Fox News, Hassett gave more details, saying the US has tariff deal offers “on the table” from more than 15 countries.
“Things are moving fast,” he said – revealing he is having a meeting with Donald Trump and his key advisers today to discuss the countries he would prioritise.
Referring to the 90-day pause announced by Trump last night, Hassett joked: “We’re going to go round the world in 80 days and have 10 days of rest – that’s our plan.”
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