Aluminum Drops as Trump Moves to Narrow Levies on Metal Products
Mike McGlone, Bloomberg Intelligence Senior Commodity Strategist, discusses gold’s latest moves and the Trump Administration’s plan to narrow levies on metal products.
Aluminum fell along with other metals as traders reacted to a possible reduction in the scope of US import tariffs on some aluminum and steel products.
Prices fell as much as 2.7% on the London Metal Exchange, extending initial losses after the Financial Times reported that President Donald Trump is planning to roll back some levies on concerns the duties are hurting consumers. The White House has communicated to companies that adjustments to levies on derivative metal products are in the works, Bloomberg reported later. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent downplayed any rollback.
Trump doubled import tariffs on commodity-grade steel and aluminum to 50% in June, and later expanded them to cover derivative products including cans, cutlery and car parts. The package of levies has disrupted the global market, reducing shipments to the US and raising prices ahead of key midterm elections.
Navigating the tariffs on derivative goods has become an arduous task for companies, as they seek to identify the percentage of the materials in goods they sourced from overseas. US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer acknowledged two months ago that “there’s some complexity” with the levies, and had discussed the difficulties with Customs and Border Protection.
Aluminum traded 2.3% lower at $3,030.00 a ton on the LME as of 1:03 p.m. local time, with all other metals on the bourse also trading lower as US stock futures edged lower, following a broad cross-asset selloff on Thursday. Tin led the decline with a 3.8% drop, while copper fell 0.9% after readily available inventories tracked by the LME rose by the most since July. That followed a drop of more than 2% on Thursday that was spurred by a broad selloff across risk assets.
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