When will US tariffs on China first go back to 50% or below again? I care because I get PCBs manufactured in China all the time, and right now it's very painful to place orders for my start-up.
Please read the answers carefully – I will resolve a contiguous range of them, with the later answers having higher prices. For example, if tariffs drop to 45% in August, and then stay there for a month, I'll resolve answers April, May, June, July as NO, and August through December as YES. (There is no "none of the above" answer, because that would just be the same as betting NO on the last answer.)
I intend to evaluate this sort of subjectively, with the rough standard being "the normal tariff that gets paid to the US to get something (say, PCBs, CNC machining, injection molding) manufactured in China is at most 50% for about a solid month or so". I think a weird landscape of bizarre carve-outs is pretty plausible, and in such cases I intend to evaluate things relatively subjectively, per my discretion of the costs to a US start-up to get real goods manufactured in China.
I am subsidizing this market because it is actually relevant to my business decision making, but I won't bet in it.
Update 2025-05-16 (PST) (AI summary of creator comment): Regarding de minimis exemptions:
An exemption primarily affecting consumer goods will generally not count towards resolution if the general tariff rate (e.g., for industrial goods relevant to a start-up) remains above 50%.
This position could be reconsidered, at the creator's discretion, if the de minimis exemption is dramatically expanded (e.g., limit significantly raised or scope broadened).
1,000
3.00Wow, this is really right on the line. I emailed another top Chinese fast-turn PCB shop (PCBWay), and they said that the tariffs I'd pay for 6-layer PCBs+PCBA would be 45%. I do not know if this is them choosing to eat some of the tariffs compared to JLCPCB. This is a little annoyingly in some gray area, right on the margin of 50%.
Given that things are a little gray, I'm going to just go with what feels to me like a relatively easy criterion that reflects the spirit of what I originally wrote. Given that I place an average of about two or three orders at JLCPCB per month, I'm just going to resolve this based on when those stop showing >50% tariffs. If I start thinking that JLCPCB is basically eating the tariffs themselves somehow, and this makes a difference to ≤50%/>50%, then I'll make some judgement calls.
Based on the orders I placed last night I'm going to declare that per my criteria right now tariffs are not ≤50%.
Okay, here's my current state:
I thought the tariffs were ≤50%, and was waiting for mid-June to resolve May to "yes".
However, I looked more closely at the order I just placed last night with JLCPCB, and I seem to have been charged 60% tariffs on both a PCB order, and a CNC order.
I emailed them to get clarification, and they confirmed that they're collecting 60%, but the real tariffs are a bit lower (but still >50%), as shown here: https://jlcpcb.com/help/article/us-tariff-policy-faq
I note that May is trading mighty high, which I guess makes sense because if I were an idealized perfect resolver then it not instantly resolving to "no" on June 1st implies that I believe that the tariffs were ≤50%.
So, my question for everyone: Am I mistaken, and is that 89% on May reflecting something I don't know about, and JLCPCB is simply wrong for charging me such high tariffs?
(I apologize to the various traders that reading this comment has such enormous alpha, but I polled several of my friends (who promised not to trade based on me asking them), and the conclusion I reached was that asking in the comments if I'm missing something is the fairest call here.)
@PeterSchmidtNielsen i was betting on what nearly all media were reporting as well as my (layman's) understanding of the May 12 White House publication of the lowered tariffs Presidential Action. It seems very strange to me that the actual tariff charged to you was higher, but I have no expertise whatsoever and can't explain whether it's incorrect or there's something missing. Thus, I've sold most of my shares for the next several months, and bought some NO for May and June.
I'd note in the linked policy faq, it shows Section 301 tariffs as 25% (on top of the everywhere-reported 30%), for which there seems to be some convoluted exclusion process, however I can't parse any of that nor can I determine whether your case applies.
Edit: those exclusions were set to expire on May 31, but just a few days ago were extended through August, whatever all that means.
Thanks for the update before resolving.
@deagol given your description I think it's entirely fair to resolve based on actual costs to your business
@PeterSchmidtNielsen judging by the commercial/industrial tone in the description (supply of real goods for a start-up), I'd assume the de minimis tariff (as of today lowered to 54% after talks) is not applicable, would you confirm? Thanks.
@deagol Yes, if the general rate is above 50%, but there's some de minimis exemption that brings it below that for a lot of relevant consumer goods, I won't count that. (Unless (at my discretion) they dramatically raise the limit and open up the de minimis exemption, or something really unlikely.)
@PeterSchmidtNielsen can you please confirm that the month when the tariffs first drop <50% and stay below for a month, the answer for that month still resolves NO? as in the example:
For example, if tariffs drop to 45% in August, and then stay there for a month, I'll resolve answers 1 through 4 as NO, and 5 through 9 as YES.
August is answer 4. edit: April was hidden.
@PeterSchmidtNielsen ok I see that there was a resolved (thus hidden from view) April answer which would make August the 5th answer, so maybe that explains it. I'd recommend editing the example mentioning the specific months "answers 1 (April) through 4 (July) resolve NO" if that's how it works.
@deagol Yes, good idea, I didn't realize it would sort resolved answers to the bottom when I wrote that. I'll edit it as you suggest.