The WTO barred China on Thursday from imposing duties on certain US steel exports, siding with US President Barack Obama in a dispute with Beijing over a type of steel made in two election battleground states.
The case involved duties imposed by China on “grain-oriented electrical steel,” which is used in the cores of high-efficiency transformers, electric motors and generators. The steel is made by AK Steel Corp of Ohio and ATI Allegheny Ludlum of Pennsylvania.
TINY CASE
Although the specialty steel case is tiny compared with other trade disputes with Beijing, the WTO ruling gave Obama a timely win as he defends himself against accusations by Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney that he is soft on China.
“Today, we are again plainly stating that we will continue to take every step necessary to ensure that China plays by the rules and does not unfairly restrict exports of US products,” US Trade Representative Ron Kirk said in a statement.
The Chinese Ministry of Commerce said in a statement on its Web site that it would “handle this case according to WTO regulations.”
However, ministry spokesman Shen Danyang (沈丹陽) criticized the “politicization” of trade issues during the US presidential campaign.
SMALL BENEFIT
Derek Scissors, a research fellow at the Heritage Foundation, said Thursday’s ruling was “a small benefit for the Obama campaign because it can advertise ‘beating China’ in Ohio, but it’s not a benchmark for anything.”
Obama has won WTO victories against Beijing in areas ranging from intellectual property rights and financial services to raw materials trade, and he has launched several other challenges, such as a case against Chinese export restrictions on rare earths.
TRADE ENFORCEMENT
He has also created an interagency trade enforcement unit to devote more resources to ensuring China and other countries abide by global trade rules.
The Romney campaign team repeated on Thursday that China was stealing US jobs and that Obama was not standing up to Beijing.
Three experts in the high technology industry have said that US President Donald Trump’s pledge to impose higher tariffs on Taiwanese semiconductors is part of an effort to force Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) to the negotiating table. In a speech to Republicans on Jan. 27, Trump said he intends to impose tariffs on Taiwan to bring chip production to the US. “The incentive is going to be they’re not going to want to pay a 25, 50 or even a 100 percent tax,” he said. Darson Chiu (邱達生), an economics professor at Taichung-based Tunghai University and director-general of
Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) is reportedly making another pass at Nissan Motor Co, as the Japanese automaker's tie-up with Honda Motor Co falls apart. Nissan shares rose as much as 6 percent after Taiwan’s Central News Agency reported that Hon Hai chairman Young Liu (劉揚偉) instructed former Nissan executive Jun Seki to connect with French carmaker Renault SA, which holds about 36 percent of Nissan’s stock. Hon Hai, the Taiwanese iPhone-maker also known as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團), was exploring an investment or buyout of Nissan last year, but backed off in December after the Japanese carmaker penned a deal
WASHINGTON POLICY: Tariffs of 10 percent or more and other new costs are tipped to hit shipments of small parcels, cutting export growth by 1.3 percentage points The decision by US President Donald Trump to ban Chinese companies from using a US tariff loophole would hit tens of billions of dollars of trade and reduce China’s economic growth this year, according to new estimates by economists at Nomura Holdings Inc. According to Nomura’s estimates, last year companies such as Shein (希音) and PDD Holdings Inc’s (拼多多控股) Temu shipped US$46 billion of small parcels to the US to take advantage of the rule that allows items with a declared value under US$800 to enter the US tariff-free. Tariffs of 10 percent or more and other new costs would slash such
SENSOR BUSINESS: The Taiwanese company said that a public tender offer would begin on May 7 through its wholly owned subsidiary Yageo Electronics Japan Yageo Corp (國巨), one of the world’s top three suppliers of passive components, yesterday said it is to launch a tender offer to fully acquire Japan’s Shibaura Electronics Co for up to ￥65.57 billion (US$429.37 million), with an aim to expand its sensor business. The tender offer would be a crucial step for the company to expand its sensor business, Yageo said. Shibaura Electronics is the world’s largest supplier of thermistors, with a market share of 13 percent, research conducted in 2022 by the Japanese firm showed. If a deal goes ahead, it would be the second acquisition of a sensor business since
RSS