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The Trump administration has excluded smartphones from its steep “reciprocal” tariffs as it battles to calm global markets by tempering its approach to the multifront trade war launched by the president.
According to a notice posted late on Friday night by Customs and Border Patrol, which is responsible for collecting tariffs, smartphones, along with routers and selected computers and laptops, would be exempt from reciprocal tariffs, which include the 125 per cent levies Donald Trump has imposed on Chinese imports.
The reprieve follows a week of intense turbulence in US markets after Trump unleashed a trade war on “liberation day” on April 2, rattling global investors and triggering a stock market rout and sell-off in the $29tn US Treasury market.
The exemption is the first sign of any softening of Trump’s tariffs against China, which he ratcheted up over the course of the last week even as he paused the steepest “reciprocal” tariffs. He retained tariffs of 10 per cent on most trading partners.
The Trump administration had already exempted several sectors from its reciprocal tariffs, including semiconductors and pharmaceuticals, but the president has signalled that he plans to apply tariffs to those sectors.
US Customs and Border Protection referred inquiries about the order to the US International Trade Commission, which did not immediately reply to a request for comment.
It was not immediately clear if smartphones imported from China would still be hit by a 20 per cent levy that was not part of the reciprocal tariffs that Trump started unveiling against China on April 2.
The White House did not respond to requests for comment.
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