By Kolawole Ojebisi
The United States, on Thursday, started witnessing the knock-on effect of President Donald Trump’s new sweeping tariffs imposition.
This is as American stock markets tumbled significantly, a development investors attributed to Trump’s wide-ranging taríff adjustments.
The US president had earlier framed the tariff as part of a larger initiative to protect American industries and ensure that foreign nations play by what he described as “fair” trade rules.
Meanwhile, according to Reuters, the S&P 500, the stock market index tracking the stock performance of 500 listed companies in the United States (US), fell by 4.8 percent, marking a steeper decline than other major stock markets.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA), commonly known as “the Dow”, also dropped by 1,679 points – reportedly the lowest slide since 2020.
Real-time data obtained from Reuters’ portal, showed that the Nasdaq composite tanked by 6 percent, while the U.S. dollar weakened, and oil prices fell more than 6 percent.
Also, the share prices of multinational companies like Nike and Apple crashed by 14.44 percent and 9.25 percent respectively.
In the tech sector, Nvidia’s shares also tumbled by 8.62 percent while Tesla’s shares dropped by 5.47 percent.
The market turmoil came less than 24 hours after Trump announced new tariffs on all goods imported into the US.
This reality contradicts Trump’s projection that the tariff would “create a hard reset on the US manufacturing industry, leading to a stronger economy and lower prices for consumers.”
Nigeria is among over 50 countries — including China, the United Kingdom, and South Africa — facing individual tariffs ranging from 10 percent to as high as 49 percent.
Trump had said the US takes care “of countries all over the world”, noting that “when you want to cut back a little bit, they get upset you’re not taking care of them any longer”.
He suggested that if the affected nations want relief, they should lift their own tariffs on American goods.
