US President Donald Trump said on Sunday that foreign governments will have to pay “a lot of money” to lift the cleaning fees he characterized as “drugs” as financial markets showed another week of sudden losses could be kept.
Speaking to reporters on Air Force 1, Trump showed he was not worried about the market loss that wiped out nearly $6 trillion in value from US stocks.
“I don’t want anything to go down, but sometimes you have to take medication to fix something,” he said.
Trump said he was talking to leaders in Europe and Asia over the weekend. He wants to convince him that the effective this week will lower the tariffs by 50%.
“They’re coming to the table. They want to talk, but we don’t have a talk unless they pay us a lot of money each year,” he said.
Last week’s Trump tariff announcement shook the economy around the world, sparking retaliation from China, and terrorism about a global trade war and recession.
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During a talk show on Sunday morning, the president’s top economic adviser tried to portray tariffs as a US savvy rearrangement in the world trade order.
They also sought to minimize the economic shock from last week’s turbulent developments. Wall Street stock futures fell sharply on Sunday, in signs of further turbulence.
U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bescent said more than 50 countries have begun negotiations with the United States since the announcement last Wednesday.
“He created the greatest leverage for himself,” Bescent told the news agency at an NBC conference.
Neither Bessent nor other officials named the country or provided details about the consultation. However, negotiating with multiple governments simultaneously could pose logistical challenges for the Trump administration and could extend economic uncertainty.
Bescent said last month that there was “no reason” to predict a recession, citing stronger than planned US employment growth.
JP Morgan economists estimate that tariffs will reduce US gross domestic product for the full year by 0.3%, down from the previous 1.3% increase, while unemployment rates will rise from the current 4.2% to 5.3%.
The Republican president spent the weekend in Florida, playing golf and posted a swing video on social media on Sunday.
Some countries are seeking reprieve
US customs agents began collecting Trump’s unsolved tariffs on all imports from many countries on Saturday. A high “mutual” tariff rate of 11-50% in individual countries is expected to be effective at 12:01am ET on Wednesday. Some governments have already shown an appetite to engage with the United States to avoid duties.
Taiwan’s President Lai Qingte on Sunday pledged to provide zero tariffs and remove trade barriers as a basis for talks with the US, saying Taiwanese companies will increase US investment.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said during a planned meeting with Trump on Monday he would seek tolerance from 17% tariffs on the country’s goods.
Indian officials told Reuters that the country is not planning to retaliate against the 26% tariffs and that negotiations with the US on possible deals are underway.
It seems likely that the market will be tanking more
After the worst week of our stocks since the onset of the Covid-19 crisis five years ago, the market has faced a more week of potential disruption.
Among the broadest scales of the US market, the S&P Composite 1500 Index has wiped out roughly $10 trillion in the US since mid-February. This has hit the eggs in the retirement nest of millions of Americans.
US President Donald Trump has shown no signs of retreating from his tariffs, even after Dow Jones dropped out of 2,200 points (the nearest worst since 2020), but the global market also took his life on the second day, causing fears of a recession around the world.
White House economic adviser Kevin Hassett denied tariffs were part of the Trump strategy to crash financial markets. He said there would be no “political coercion” by the central bank.
On Friday’s Truth Social Post, Trump shared a video suggesting his tariffs that were intentionally intended to hit the stock market to force lower interest rates.
Social media has encouraged global debate about whether Trump’s tariffs are part of a permanent new tariff regime or part of negotiation tactics that could ease tariffs through concessions by other countries.
