The US will impose a 104% tariff on some Chinese imports from tomorrow, the White House has confirmed. Meanwhile, Elon Musk has branded the president’s tariff adviser „a moron“ – and UK markets closed up.
Tuesday 8 April 2025 22:49, UK
By Victoria Seabrook, climate reporter
While wealthy Western countries have been weaning themselves off coal for the last two decades, Donald Trump is now trying to take the US in the opposite direction.
The president is issuing further orders to start digging and burning more of what he calls „beautiful, clean coal“.
Why? The „good“ thing about coal is that it is cheap, reliable and abundant.
But coal is a disaster for the climate – releasing more planet-heating carbon dioxide than oil and gas, and plenty of sooty air pollution.
Read more here…
The floor of the New York Stock Exchange isn’t the bear pit it used to be.
Trading has evolved from a contact sport to a more sedate process – think computer screens and cathedral calm.
They don’t shout like they used to but, right now, I swear you can hear them scream. It’s been a tough few days.
In a city that hasn’t slept since markets started tumbling, Wall Street traders wear the burden of the horror they have seen and still see ahead.
The NYSE is the business end of political change and the balance sheet reads red.
„Welcome to the chaos,“ was the welcome from the host to a student party I bumped into at reception.
Ironically, the job of ringing the trading bell was given to the New York Fire Department – insert your own joke about emergencies, putting out fires etc. Green is good in this place. It’s the colour of stocks doing well on TV monitors around the Exchange floor.
As trading began, it was all turning green as trading was buoyant – relatively.
It had the feel of what they call an „upday“ here, but the feeling didn’t last.
By close of trading, the monitors were reading red as markets fell once again, on news that Donald Trump was, indeed, imposing 104% tariffs on China. And then there’s there the „boys will be boys“ drama playing out in Washington DC, Musk versus Navarro.
Political unity it isn’t, nor does it feed certainty around the Trump administration’s direction on tariffs. On the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, they wait for the day when things are looking up.
They are braced for „down days“ between now and then.
Most countries have been trying to avoid a tit-for-tat trade war.
But not China.
It’s hit back on Donald Trump’s levies with a 34% tariff of its own.
Here, Sky’s business and economics reporter Gurpreet Narwan takes a look at what escalation looks like…
Donald Trump is now speaking about his sweeping tariffs and says the US will take $2bn a day from tariffs.
The US president made the comment without providing details.
Back to Donald Trump who is speaking at the White House.
Surrounded by coal workers, Trump says this is a „very important day“.
„We are bringing back an industry that was abandoned,“ he says.
The US president says today he will end Joe Biden’s „war on beautiful clean coal“ and miners „will be put back to work“.
Trump is signing an executive order to declare coal a mineral, which it is not. Coal is a sedimentary rock and is classified as a fossil fuel.
We have the final market figures from the New York Stock Exchange this evening.
According to preliminary data, the S&P 500 lost 75.85 points, or 1.49%, to end at 4,986.40 points.
And the Nasdaq Composite lost 335.35 points, or 2.15%, to 15,267.91.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 319.58 points, or 0.84%, to 37,657.76.
Donald Trump is back in the White House to sign another executive order.
The US president is due to sign an order to boost production of „beautiful, clean coal“ and declare it a mineral – though it isn’t.
Watch the president wielding his marker pen in the stream above – and we’ll also bring you any tariff updates here.
It’s been another choppy day of trading, but markets have generally rallied, with UK stocks closing up.
We’ll see where the US stock markets close when the bell rings at 9pm.
Watch that moment live here – and we’ll have the final numbers for the day shortly afterwards.
And of course, we’re still waiting to see Donald Trump signing an executive oil on coal – that was expected at 8pm.
Earlier, the White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said that Democrat politicians „have long said that the United States has been ripped off“ by countries around the world – and Donald Trump was finally answering their call (see post at 6.53pm).
She quoted senator Chuck Schumer, who in 2007 said this about the country’s trade deficit…
These are the kind of records the American people don’t want us to be breaking. The administration needs to move beyond words, take action now to reverse a trend that threatens our prospects for future economic growth.
Fast forward 17 years and Schumer said this on Trump’s sweeping tariffs on the Senate floor yesterday…
Donald Trump is teeing up a nationwide recession. If a recession does happen, it will be known as the Trump recession. I urge the president to back off from his disastrous tariffs immediately.
He should put down the golf clubs and pick up the papers, because the disaster he has created is anything but great. On the contrary, liberation day is quickly turning into Donald Trump’s infamous mission accomplished moment.
He also said Trump had „started the largest, dumbest trade war in American history“, and „all the signs say America is heading towards calamity“.
Elon Musk has thrown more shade at Peter Navarro, Donald Trump’s tariffs adviser…
The pair have been arguing publicly over Trump’s decision to impose sweeping tariffs on most of its trading partners.
But the row between them has been dismissed by the White House, with press secretary Karoline Leavitt saying a short while ago: „Boys will be boys.“
Navarro is widely seen as the architect of Trump’s wide-ranging tariff plans.
The policy is intended to revive US manufacturing and shore up national security but it has hammered markets.
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Tariffs latest: 'Boys will be boys' – White House reacts to Musk row; China faces 104% tariff from tomorrow – Sky News
