President Donald Trump really said in a real social position on Tuesday that the United States had reached an agreement with Japan to reduce its 15% rate after Japanese officials said they would invest $ 500 billion in the United States.
That rate is less than 24% with which Trump threatened Japan on April 2 and 25% who said he would hit Japanese imports in a letter on July 7. Before Trump’s current term, the United States effective rate in Japanese imports was less than 2%, according to World Bank data.
The Japan Foreign Ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comments on the details of the agreement.
The announcement occurs a few days before August 1, the last deadline imposed by Trump in countries to make an agreement to avoid tariff rates that Trump had established in dozens of letters that shot on social networks. Although this deadline had been delayed before, Treasury secretary, Scott Besent, said Tuesday at Fox Business Network that it was a “quite difficult deadline.”
From the so -called “Liberation Day” of Trump on April 2, the Administration has not yet reached any formal commercial agreement, instead of signing a handful of framework agreements that can become fully complete agreements later.
Japan has furiously trying to avoid the greatest success of Trump’s global tariffs as possible. The main commercial negotiator of Japan has visited the United States at least eight times, more recently on Sunday when he held a more than two hours meeting with the Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick.
As part of the agreement, Trump said Japan “would invest, in my direction, $ 550 billion in the United States, which will receive 90% of the profits.” It was not clear how such an investment would work.
Trump promoted the announcement in an event with the Republicans of Congress later on Tuesday, saying that tariffs “were put into play better than anyone else and some people in the room thought it could happen.”
Trump added that Japan would be forming a joint business with the United States related to liquefied natural gas in Alaska.
Japan was the fifth highest source of US imports in 2024, with US consumers and companies that bought almost $ 150 billion in the country, according to data from the Department of Commerce.
The conversations with Japan arrived at a difficult time politically for the government of Japan. The ruling party of Prime Minister Shigeru Ihiba recently lost both Chambers of Parliament. Ishiba promised to remain as a leader, partly to address winds against economic.
Trump had recently minimized the possibilities of an agreement with Japan.
“The Japanese are difficult, but ultimately, you have to understand that we are only going to send a letter that says ‘this is what you are going to pay, otherwise you do not have to do business with us.’ But there is a possibility,” Trump said on June 16.
In May, Trump approved an acquisition of US steel steel of US for a long time for Japan Nippon Steel. As part of that agreement, Nippon agreed to create at least 70,000 jobs through an investment of $ 14 billion, according to companies and the White House. Companies then increased to 100,000 jobs, but clarified that these additions included “direct, indirect and induced jobs.”
