It’s tough not to begin by commenting about what transpired in the Oval Office on Friday. Absolutely surreal. Putin will be smiling from ear to ear and it looks like the path for the Russia-Ukraine conflict to end just took a bad turn. But with that being whatever it was, the focus switches back to tariffs again in the new week/month.
Trump’s tariffs on Canada and Mexico are set to kick in tomorrow and the deadline for any negotiations is starting to narrow. We’ve had a month of dilly-dally but we’re back in the same spot as we were previously in February. It was never about fentanyl and this latest potential concession by Mexico makes it rather clear.
So, the question is will there be another delay or is Trump going to follow through?
I suspect even on the latter, it might not be the full 25% tariffs touted initially. US commerce secretary Lutnick had said over the weekend that the “situation is fluid” but “there are going to be tariffs on Tuesday”. However, he added that “exactly what they are, we’re going to leave that for the president and his team to negotiate”.
So far in the first 42 days of his presidency, one can argue that Trump’s bark has been more threatening than his bite. We’ll have to see if the next 24 hours will be another case of that.