Author: ALJAZEERA

United States consumer sentiment plunged in April, marking the fourth month in a row of declines – widely seen as a pointed reaction to President Donald Trump’s escalating trade wars, which have fuelled concerns over potential job losses and rising inflation. The preliminary reading of the University of Michigan’s closely watched consumer sentiment index, released Friday, fell 11 percent in March to 50.8 percent, the lowest since the depths of the COVID-19 pandemic. Over the past year, sentiment tumbled 34 percent. The decline was “pervasive and unanimous across age, income, education, geographic region, and political affiliation”, Survey of Consumers director…

Fashion brand Prada has agreed to buy its smaller rival Versace for $1.38bn from Capri Holdings, bringing together two of the biggest names in Italian fashion and the prospect of enhanced revenues. The deal was announced on Thursday. Prada is seeking to expand, having defied a slowdown in luxury demand, while Versace has been operating at a loss in recent quarters. Owning Versace, with its bold, baroque-style prints, will bring new customers to Prada, known for its minimalist style. “There are no overlaps in terms of creativity, in terms of customers,” said Lorenzo Bertelli, marketing director and a member of…

On April 2, 2025, President Donald Trump declared a 10 percent tariff on all imports, effective on April 5, with additional country-specific tariffs set to commence on April 9. ​The announcement sent shockwaves through the global economy, triggering the worst two-day loss in United States stock market history. On Thursday and Friday alone, $6.6 trillion in value was wiped out before markets closed for the weekend. After a slight recovery on Tuesday, stocks fell once again on Wednesday as President Trump’s new tariffs on imports from dozens of countries took effect, including a steep 104 percent tariff on goods from…

The United States Department of Justice has announced it plans to pare back its investigations into cryptocurrency fraud, instead redirecting those resources towards immigration enforcement, terrorism and drug trafficking. In a memo late on Monday, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche quoted President Donald Trump’s pledge to “end the regulatory weaponization” of the cryptocurrency industry. “The Department of Justice is not a digital assets regulator,” Blanche wrote. “The Justice Department will no longer pursue litigation or enforcement actions that have the effect of superimposing regulatory frameworks on digital assets.” Instead, Blanche explained that Trump regulators in other departments would enforce financial…

President Trump threatens additional 50 percent tariff on China, as Beijing pledges to fight trade salvoes ‘to the end’.US stocks have mostly closed lower after a day of wild swings in the market, as investors scrambled to make sense of United States President Donald Trump’s tariff plans. The benchmark S&P 500 and Dow Jones Industrial Average on Monday fell 0.23 percent and 0.91 percent, respectively, racking up a third consecutive day of losses. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite finished slightly up, rising 0.099 percent. The dip followed a day of volatile trading, with unfounded reports that Trump was considering a 90-day…

United States President Donald Trump has brushed off the market turmoil caused by his sweeping tariffs, likening the measures to “medicine” as panicked investors continued a massive sell-off of global stocks. “I don’t want anything to go down but, sometimes, you have to take medicine to fix something,” Trump told reporters on board Air Force One on Sunday. “We have been treated so badly by other countries because we had stupid leadership that allowed this to happen. They took our businesses, they took our money, they took our jobs.” Digging in on his so-called “reciprocal tariffs”, Trump said he would…

In justifying his latest tariffs announcement, President Donald Trump complains of unfair trade deficits, saying the US has been “looted, pillaged, raped, plundered” by other countries for decades. He has blamed China for exploiting the United States through unfair trade agreements, condemned Canada’s high tariffs on American dairy as unacceptable, and criticized Cambodia for imposing excessive tariffs and benefiting at the US’s expense for years. What he has left out in his repeated criticisms is the trade surplus the US benefits from when it comes to his country’s service industry. Services make up about 70 percent of the US economy.…

Two days after sending the economy reeling by announcing widespread tariffs, United States President Donald Trump headed to play golf at Mar-a-Lago, his private club in Palm Beach, Florida, even as the sell-off for financial markets worldwide is slamming into a higher, scarier gear. Before heading to his private golf course, Trump wrote on social media: “THIS IS A GREAT TIME TO GET RICH.” Investors are not buying that message. The S&P 500 tumbled 5.7 percent as Wall Street’s worst crisis since the COVID pandemic crash deepened after China matched Trump’s big rise in tariffs announced earlier this week. The…

On Wednesday, President Donald Trump announced a sweeping 10 percent global baseline tariff on almost all imports to the United States, claiming the move marks the “Liberation Day” of the US economy. The policy is, however, as pro-US as the People’s Liberation Army of China. If maintained, the tariffs will prove extremely damaging to the US economy, the American consumer, and the country’s standing in the world. The 10 percent tariff is remarkably the baseline; Trump’s efforts to liberate the US economy include numerous far higher tariffs. One example is his 25 percent tariff on all automotive imports that came…

On March 4, the US-Mexico border was at a standstill. The trucks that Thor Salayandia was planning to send across a checkpoint to the United States sat in the lot. The only thing moving was the confusion in the air. Salayandia owns and operates a factory in Juarez, Mexico that makes auto parts and ships truckloads of metal tubes to warehouses in the US state of Texas for assembly. For the past month, his business has been thrown into turbulent waters. “It’s becoming a political game … so for two days there was a considerable reduction in traffic. Even the…