By Sarah Taaffe-Maguire, business and economics reporter
Remember tariffs? They’re taxes imposed on imports and US President Donald Trump is once again threatening to raise them, this time against eight European countries for not supporting his plan to take over the Danish territory of Greenland.
Tariffs of 10% would take effect on 1 February for Denmark, Norway, Sweden, France, Germany, the UK, the Netherlands and Finland, a rate that would then climb to 25% on 1 June if no deal was in place to purchase Greenland.
At least we have precedent for this. Last April, after Mr Trump’s so-called Liberation Day announcement of country-specific tariffs, we saw a stock market sell-off.
Looks like we’ll see something similar today.
There are signs investors are flocking to perceived safe-haven investments.
Gold kicked off the week by hitting a new record of $4,690 per ounce. Silver also traded at a never-before-seen high, just above $94 an ounce, and copper is also up.
The trade tensions have also seen the US dollar fall, with £1 now almost equal to $1.34.
US stock markets are closed for a bank holiday, so we won’t see a reaction there, but in the UK, the flagship FTSE 100 index of most valuable London Stock Exchange-listed companies was down 0.5%.
In Europe more broadly, it’s a sea of red with big losses being recorded, particularly in Scandinavian countries.
Denmark’s main stock index, the OMX Copenhagen 20, dropped 2.7%, Norway’s Oslo Bors lost more than 1.4%, and Finland’s Helsinki 25 shed 1.8%.
