If you live in the US, be prepared to pay more for the Apple iPhone. A multi-part tweet disseminated by President Donald Trump revealed that soon, $200bn of Chinese goods imported into the US will be taxed at a 25 per cent rate, up from the current 10 per cent.
Trump also noted that $50bn of hi-tech goods from China that are imported by the US already are taxed at 25 per cent. While the Apple iPhone and other Apple devices have managed to evade the tariff charges, Trump is now talking about taxing hundreds of billions of dollars of additional Chinese products imported into the states, possibly including the iPhone. While Apple designs its products in the US, they are assembled by contract manufacturers in China and imported into the US.
Trump could be merely seeking to raise the pressure on China to reach an agreement with the US. A negotiating team from the country will travel to Washington this week for a round of talks. This could be the last chance for both nations to reach an agreement and end a trade war that has weakened China’s economy. That weakness has hurt Apple’s business in the country. During the company’s fiscal second quarter, which ran from January through March, Apple saw its sales in China declined by 21.5 per cent from $13.02bn to $10.22bn.