The Bureau of Industry and Security is facing a backlog of export license applications and a barrage of questions from industry after applications were put on hold earlier this month, although the agency hopes to see processing slowly return to normal as political appointees are put in place, Export Compliance Daily has learned.
The European Commission criticized President Donald Trump’s plans to impose reciprocal tariffs against trading partners (see 2502130030), calling it a “step in the wrong direction” and vowing to protect European businesses from any “unjustified tariff measures.”
India and the U.S. will negotiate a bilateral trade agreement that will cover multiple sectors in tranches, with the first aiming for completion in the fall of 2025, President Donald Turmp and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi said in their joint statement, released after their meeting Feb. 13. The two leaders also announced plans to increase U.S. military sales to India and possibly reduce defense trade restrictions under the International Traffic in Arms Regulations.
Former President Joe Biden's administration made the most “aggressive and far-reaching use” of trade tools of any U.S. administration in history, and the new Trump administration is on track to “wield these tools in an even more aggressive manner,” Gibson Dunn said in a 2024 international trade recap released this month. Although the Treasury Department under Biden imposed sanctions at a faster rate than any of his predecessors, the law firm noted that President Donald Trump favors tariffs, which could cause the targets of those tariffs, including U.S. trading partners in Europe and Asia, to deploy similar tools “either in retaliation against U.S. measures or in pursuit of their own strategic interests.”
Japan has asked the Trump administration to exempt it from new 25% tariffs on steel and aluminum imports, Japanese Minister of Economy, Trade and Industry Yoji Muto said during a Feb. 12 press conference.
The U.S. needs to expand its export controls on semiconductor manufacturing equipment to focus on "foundational" chips and not just advanced ones, policy analyst Dmitri Alperovitch said.
The EU this week said it plans to retaliate against President Donald Trump’s decision to increase tariffs on steel and aluminum. “Unjustified tariffs on the EU will not go unanswered,” European Commission President Ursula Ursula von der Leyen said in a statement. “They will trigger firm and proportionate countermeasures.”
The first few weeks of the new Trump administration have shown that there appears to be a “fair amount of continuity” from the Biden administration on certain China trade policies, including around export controls and outbound investment restrictions, a former Biden National Security Council official said.
China opened a dispute at the World Trade Organization on Feb. 5 to challenge the new 10% tariff imposed by the U.S. on all goods from China, claiming that the measure violates the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade. China said that not only do the duties violate the U.S. government's "Schedule of Concessions and Commitments," they're also "discriminatory and protectionist in nature."
The European Commission is pushing for new import fees and customs controls on certain low-value e-commerce imports that it said are unsafe, counterfeit or don’t meet other EU product standards. The controls could target products from online marketplaces such as AliExpess, Amazon, Shein and Temu, the commission said, adding that those companies could be liable for the sale of unsafe products on their platforms.