President Donald Trump said he will impose a 50% tariff to copper imports on Tuesday, and suggested that there are more specific rights of the sector on the way.
“Today we are copper,” Trump said during a cabinet meeting at the White House. “I think the copper rate, we will do 50%.” He did not specifically say when that rate would go into force.
Trump also said that he would soon announce tariffs “at a very, very high rate, such as 200%”, in pharmaceutical imports.
Pharmaceutical companies could have up to a year and a half to start producing their products in the United States before these new rates enter into force, Trump added.
Copper prices jumped to a higher record after Trump’s abrupt announcement, with the September futures contract by increasing 10.5% to $ 5,8955 per pound.
Copper Mineport-Mcmoran actions, meanwhile, increased 5% since investors expect national producers to benefit from the rate.
Copper is the third most consumed metal, behind iron and aluminum. The United States imports almost half of the copper it uses, most of which comes from Chile, according to data from the United States geological service.
Trump at the end of February ordered investigation into possible new tariffs on copper imports in national security land.
The Secretary of Commerce, Howard Lutnick, said in the “Energy Lunch” of CNBC later on Tuesday that investigation ended.
“The idea is to bring copper home, take the copper production home,” Lutnick said. He pointed out that Trump’s movement will put copper tariffs on American tariffs on the imports of steel and aluminum online, which Trump doubled 50% in early June.
Lutnick said he expected Trump to sign a proclamation that would put the copper rate in his place at the end of July.
The new commercial ads on copper and pharmaceutical products are separated from the “reciprocal” tariffs that Trump made known in early April, when he imposed a 10% basal tax in imports of almost all other countries, as well as much higher rates in dozens of individual nations.
Trump has repeatedly delayed the highest reciprocal rates to take effect. But on Monday, he sent a series of letters by dictating new tariff rates in imports from 14 countries, including Japan, South Korea and Thailand.
Those rate of individualized blankets, which ranged between 25% and 40%, will enter into force on August 1.
– CNBC Spencer Kimball contributed to this report.
