Donald Trump’s Trade Team Looks to Shrink Metals Tariffs

Bloomberg, the Financial Times, and Reuters contributed to this report.

Supply Lines, the daily newsletter that tracks global trade, has the latest: the administration is quietly working to narrow a wide swath of steel and aluminum tariffs that businesses find hard to price — and that the European Union wants tightened up as part of a pending trade deal, according to reporting by Bloomberg and the Financial Times.

Why it matters: the tariffs — slapped on last June and in places as high as 50% — were blunt instruments. Officials now apparently think some of those levies are doing more harm than good for consumers and complicated trade flows, so they’re trying to carve out exceptions or trim the scope. That prospect is already adding another layer of price uncertainty to metals markets.

Markets reacted fast. Benchmark three-month aluminum on the London Metal Exchange slid about 2.4% to $3,027 a metric ton — its weakest close since Feb. 6. The most-active aluminum contract on the Shanghai Futures Exchange fell 1.8% to 23,195 yuan/ton. Copper eased too, trading down about 0.4% at roughly $12,820 a ton, while zinc, nickel, lead and tin all gave up ground as traders locked in profits and stepped back from risk.

“Macro-driven risk-off and broad profit-taking continue to unwind the strong early-year rally,” said Ewa Manthey, who added that talk of tariff rollbacks introduced fresh uncertainty for trade flows and pricing.

A few other forces are at play: trading volumes often thin ahead of the Chinese New Year holiday, and supply worries that pushed some contracts higher earlier in the week have cooled. Still, the bigger story is political — any trimming of the tariff regime could reshape import costs, feed through to manufacturers, and change where buyers source raw materials.

On the ground, companies hate the calculation headaches. The tariffs cover a long laundry list of products, and firms say it’s tricky to figure out which rate applies — which can delay shipments, raise compliance costs, and jack up prices for buyers.

Bottom line: the administration’s outreach to narrow the tariffs might be seen as a relief by some industrial users, but for commodity traders and producers it just swaps one kind of certainty for another. Until policy is finalized, expect more headline-driven swings in metal prices.