The tariffs would ensnare cutting-edge smartphone and PC-related chips for Apple, AMD and Nvidia if enacted. But Trump is betting his plan will bring more chip production to the US.
spoiler
President Trump is preparing to place tariffs beyond Chinese assembled electronics to computer chips made in Taiwan, warning the tariffs could reach as high as 100%.
“In particular, in the very near future, we’re going to be placing tariffs on foreign production of computer chips, semiconductors and pharmaceuticals to return production of these essential goods to the United States,” Trump said in a speech to Republicans on Monday.
“They left us and went to Taiwan,” he then said in an apparent reference to how many of the leading US tech companies have been sourcing their processors from Taiwan’s TSMC, a top semiconductor manufacturer. TSMC has established a factory in Arizona, but much of its chip production remains in Taiwan, where it’s been serving clients including Apple, Nvidia, Qualcomm and AMD, among others.
“We want them to come back,” Trump said before slamming the US’s CHIPS and Science Act, which his predecessor President Biden signed to invest over $52 billion in domestic chip manufacturing.
“And we don’t want to give them billions of dollars like this ridiculous program that Biden has given everybody billions of dollars. They already have billions of dollars,” Trump said. “They’ve got nothing but money Joe. They didn’t need money. They needed an incentive. And the incentive is gonna be they’re not gonna wanna pay a 25, 50 or even a 100 % tax.”
“They’re gonna build their factory with their own money. We don’t have to give them money,” Trump added, later claiming: “They’re giving the money, they don’t even know what they’re going to do with it.”
The recipients of the funding, such as Intel, might disagree. Last year, Intel received $7.9 billion from the CHIPS Act, which will go toward expanding its factories in Arizona, New Mexico, Oregon and Ohio, where the company is building a new chip manufacturing hub. Even so, Trump is betting his tariff threat will push more US tech companies into migrating their chip manufacturing to the US over Taiwan.
“The only way you’ll get out of this is to build your plant —if you want to stop paying the taxes or the tariffs— you’ll have to build your plant right here in America,” Trump added. “That’s what’s going to happen at record levels.”
Still, it takes years to build a chip factory, meaning any tariffs on Taiwanese-manufactured chips risk causing price hikes for numerous computer products, such as Nvidia graphics cards, Apple iPhones and AMD processors, which all come from TSMC factories. That said, a lot will depend on how US trade officials implement such a tariff policy. TSMC-made chips usually aren’t exported directly to the US, but sent to China and other Asian countries, where they’re then assembled into consumer electronics bound for the US.
I don’t want to live in the economic conditions this dude is gonna create, but God damn if his erratic and impulsive threats and decisions aren’t funny as hell.
Imagine being a US company, one day you’re massively profitable, the next China unveils that it made a product that all of your clients make for a fraction of the cost and it works way better and it’s open source. The day after that your own president says your products are getting a tariff as high as 100% when you ship them back home.
I’d love to hear what they’re saying in some of these corporate offices and board rooms today. Surely absolute panic.
I’d love to hear what they’re saying in some of these corporate offices and board rooms today
“What’s John Hinckley up to these days?”
“Is there a Luigi for Presidents?”
I just love how all the tech CEOs started licking Trump’s ass just to get completely shat on by his overinflated ego.
I’m sure he thinks he’s doing them a favor. O can’t do the cadence, but something about banning Chinese tech makes it so people will have to buy “American computers” probably. Completely incoherent.
I thought he just wanted to do something bombastic and one-up China to boost his own ego. I don’t think a narcissist like him even wastes a single second thinking about doing others a favor.
I would love to be a fruitfly in corporate meetings by Meta/AMD/Apple/Nvidia to watch the meltdown of upper executives today.
As much as I enjoy Trump collapsing the American empire by spitting into the hand of every country that feeds it, how could corporate interests look at all this and think “this is fine”?
Surely turning the nation’s back on trading partners can’t benefit US corpos in the long run whatsoever, but then again what do I know?
Yeah I kind of understand corpos and billionaires kissing the ring. I cant see them being happy about Trump fucking with the money though
Or maybe they know a weaker US and stronger China is good for them, and they’re speedrunning US collapse by
and letting Trump do his thing.These guys have wealth beyond imagine. If the value of everything in America becomes significantly less as a result of these economic policies, they’ll be able to pick up the peaces with the unimaginable amounts of money they all sit on.
Congrats to everyone who bought puts on NVDA yesterday.
“Noooo not the chips, don!”He also argued that government grants like the CHIPS Act are unnecessary and counterproductive and that companies should use their own resources to build fabs rather than rely on public funding.
Get their asses
To be a fly on the wall that minute someone whispered into his ear about Taiwanese chip manufacturing. You know he had never held the thought where any of our microchips come from, or even if he did, he’ll still be thinking “MICROCHIPS” instead of cpus, gous, etc. cause he harbors absolutely no curiosity for these things
All 2nd term Trump know is threaten war, tax chip and lie
I underestimated trump. Wondering how long till some capitalist puts a hit out on him, purely to save the american empire. Like, hate the deportations and horrible transphobia, but I can appreciate his anti-imperialist economic policies.
Seems like a great way to lose Taiwan to China, which at least checks out with Trump’s isolationism, but surely is pissing off a lot of state and corporate ghouls
Well, that’s NVIDIA fucked, since they get their chips from Taiwan.
I’m sure Intel will take up the slack… you know, the company that completely abandoned working on the leading node , and has a massive, mutli billion dollar judgement hanging over them from selling chips that they knew were shitty and busted. Of course they already got 8 billion or so from Biden to improve production a few years ago, and did fuck all with it.
did they get any money from CHIPS? Many of the recipients suggested the money hadnt actually landed as of a few months ago.
I’m not particularly well-versed in macroeconomics and all that, but I feel extra ignorant right now. What in the name of everloving fuck is this supposed to achieve?
I like to think I can usually understand the reasoning behind this kind of economic decision enough to either agree or disagree with it and kind of contemplate what might be its results, but I’m really at a loss here.
They saw what happened to sanctioned Russia and thought they could do it to themselves
Increase demand for chips before tariffs go into effect then just never enact the sanctions?
That’s the only way I can see this making sense. This has got to be a bluff, otherwise it’s total nonsense, the way I understand it
Is Trump genuinely trying to speedrun the collapse of the American Empire?
Literally what the fuck. He has absolutely no idea of anything going on. This move on its own will make the USA a global pariah. I mean I say that every week but holy shit whyyyyyy. NOONE IS GOING TO DO BUSINESS WITH YOU NOW.
I might hate America but I also hate incompitence.
WHAT DOES THIS ACCOMPLISH???
IS THIS ALL A
MEASURING CONTEST TO YOUSorry for yelling
I might hate America but I also hate incompitence.
I feel this so hard. Like, to some extent I even try to judge these people on their own metrics, like what are you trying to achieve and will this do it, and so often their decisions are baffling even from that view.
They’re evil, for sure, but they’re also incredibly stupid and incompetent
the lib refrain is ramping up: “Trump is a puppet of foreign adversaries”. He works for Russia! He works for China! He works for both! This is Voldemoard Potins master KGB plan of Stalin! like holy fuck, is it just impossible to grasp that a bunch of burger fascists are just really fucking stupid without doing the “what are we, a buncha asians”?
I hope this brings a swift death to the American empireAlso, lol, lmao, even. These people don’t even know how imperialism works
Fucking lmao if he does it and it’s not just hot air.
