Trade policy Trump 2.0 and US trade
trade-wars
Tariff uncertainty widened, rather than narrowed, the US trade deficit in early 2025, as stockpiling of gold, semiconductors, and pharmaceutical inputs inflated imports.
Rather than shrinking the deficit as intended, Trump’s protectionist agenda coincided with a stockpiling boom — a $71 billion surge in gold imports plus heavy buying of semiconductors and pharmaceutical hormones from Ireland — that pushed the average monthly US trade deficit to around $115 billion. The piece frames this as part of a broader shift away from the rules-based multilateral trading system toward bilateral deals and fragmentation, with the fuller costs still to land as more tariffs take effect from August 2025 onward.
Originally published on Substack, August 8, 2025.