Asian markets surge as Trump halts most tariffs for 90 days
Financial markets in the Asia-Pacific region experienced a sharp increase on Thursday after U.S. President Donald Trump announced a 90-day pause on most "reciprocal" tariffs. Despite the tariff hikes on imports of Chinese products, the stock markets in China also opened on a positive note.
In Tokyo, the Nikkei 225 index started trading with a 1.9% increase, then gained 9% compared to Wednesday's closing, reaching the level of 34,568.
Asian stock markets go up after Trump's decision change
In Seoul, the Kospi index started trading with a 4.4% rise.
Taiwan's Taiex recorded a record increase of 9.3% just a few minutes after opening. The largest increase since March 2020 was also seen in Australia, where the S&P/ASX 200 index gained 5.3%, reaching the level of 7,764, at 10:30 PM local time.
Donald Trump ordered on Wednesday a 90-day pause on applying increased tariffs for other countries, adding that during this period the tariffs are to be 10%.
An exception to the tariff "pause" is China, for which Trump announced raising the import tax to 125%. Despite this, Chinese markets opened with a slight increase.
In Hong Kong, the Hang Seng index gained 3.1% to 20,887, and the Hang Seng Tech index rose by 4.1%.
The Chinese CSI300 index rose by 1.7%. Also in the positive is the Shanghai Composite Index and Shenzhen Composite Index, which gained 1.3% and 2% respectively in the morning.
China reacts to Trump's decision
As part of retaliatory measures, China's Ministry of Finance announced on Wednesday an increase in tariffs on goods imported from the U.S. from the previously announced 34% to 84%. They will come into effect on Thursday at 12:01 PM local time.
Following Trump's decision on Wednesday, stock prices on Wall Street experienced rapid and significant increases, recovering a large portion of the losses from the past four days. Within minutes of the announcement, the Dow Jones index rose by nearly 7%, while the tech-heavy NASDAQ increased by 10%.
However, experts cited by the AFP agency perceive that uncertainty about U.S. tariff policy still exists. The stock market gains are accompanied by a drop in oil prices and an increase in the value of the yen, indicating ongoing investor nervousness.
