TRADE-ANALYSIS : Struggling to negotiate, Trump often claims countries are eager to talk

Here’s what happens to markets if U.S. tariffs on China kick in Dec. 15

The S&P 500 index fell for a third day, though it pared some of its losses in afternoon trading. The morning

brought a flood of trade headlines that rattled markets, with the Trump administration signaling the U.S. plans to move forward with tariffs on Chinese goods if no deal is reached before the mid-December deadline. The president had earlier indicated he’d be willing to wait another year before striking an agreement with China. He also threatened levies on France after hitting steel from Brazil and Argentina.

Treasuries surged, driving yields down the most since August, as gold, the yen and the Swiss franc paced gains among haven assets. The cost to protect North American investment-grade debt against default jumped as trade-war induced volatility shook markets. Jefferies warned currency traders to buckle up before the tariff deadline, saying “put your helmet back on.”

The flurry of trade news roiled global markets just as investors started dipping their toes into riskier waters. A rush to assets that usually outperform during times of economic growth pushed U.S. stocks to record highs last month. But renewed tariff tension and signs of profit deterioration could make traders again more cautious amid the longest bull market on record.

“The narrative on trade has quickly been turned upside down as negative headlines on tariffs have ignited a risk-averse tone in the markets,” said Charlie Ripley, senior investment strategist for Allianz Investment Management. “Today’s headlines are a short reminder of the downside risks that still remain across the investing landscape.”

Chinese state media said Tuesday the government would soon publish a list of “unreliable entities” that could lead to sanctions against American companies. Meantime, France said the European Union would retaliate if the U.S. follows through on a threat to hit about $2.4 billion of French products with levies.

Elsewhere, oil rose as traders focused on the upcoming OPEC+ meeting that could lead to deeper supply cuts by some of the biggest crude producers.

Here are some key events coming up this week:

–Germany releases factory-order data for October on Thursday.

–Saudi Aramco’s initial public offering is scheduled to be priced on Thursday, with Riyadh looking to raise more than $25 billion.

–Friday brings the U.S. jobs report, where estimates are for non-farm payrolls to rise by 190,000 in November.

These are the main moves in markets:

Stocks

–The S&P 500 dipped 0.9% to 3,085.23 as of 2:54 p.m. New York time. It closed at 3,093,20, or down 0.66%. Nasdag closed at 8,520.64 , down 0.55%. Dow Jones dropped 1.01 per cent to close at 27,502.81.

–The Stoxx Europe 600 index decreased 0.6%.

–The MSCI Asia Pacific index fell 0.3%.

Currencies

–The Bloomberg Dollar Spot index decreased 0.1%.

–The euro was little changed at $1.1081.

–The Japanese yen appreciated 0.4% to 108.59 per dollar.

Bonds

–The yield on 10-year Treasuries sank 11 basis points to 1.71%.

–Germany’s 10-year yield slid seven basis points to -0.35%.

–Britain’s 10-year yield decreased seven basis points to 0.67%.

Commodities

–The Bloomberg Commodity index advanced 0.3%.

–West Texas Intermediate crude climbed to $56.10 a barrel.

–Gold gained 1% to $1,484.20 an ounce.

If gold exports are excluded, the total value will be $6.9 billion, up 6.24 per cent.

The continued growth was mainly attributed to the increase in gold exports of 93.23 per cent, he added.

Exports to Asean countries rose 198.03 per cent, jumping 306 per cent to Singapore and 146 per cent to Cambodia.

However, he warned that exports in the remaining period of this year might face pressure from the ongoing trade wars, the protests in Hong Kong, and a strengthening baht.

Weerasak advised exporters to focus more on growing markets such as Asean and India. They should also concentrate on selling products via e-commerce channels, he added.

The Dec. 15 flashpoint on tariffs was thrown into sharp relief Tuesday when Trump said he sees no urgency to complete a deal, right after he threatened an assortment of trading partners with levies.

TRADE-ANALYSIS : Struggling to negotiate, Trump often claims countries are eager to talk

“If tariffs scheduled for Dec. 15 are implemented it would be a huge shock to the market consensus,” said Sue Trinh, managing director for global macro strategy at Manulife Investment Management in Hong Kong. “Trump would be the Grinch that stole Christmas,” she said.

Global equities came within a whisker of their all-time high last month, propelled in part by swelling optimism that at least an interim U.S.-China trade deal was in the offing. Meantime, the clock kept ticking toward Dec. 15, when Trump has threatened to impose 15% levies on $160 billion of Chinese imports.

With about two weeks to go on the China front, the Trump administration Monday hit Brazil and Argentina with steel tariffs and proposed levies on France as punishment over a tax that’s hit large American tech companies.

Moves by self-styled Tariff Man Monday were enough to trigger the biggest Wall Street sell-off in eight weeks — with a little help from a weak U.S. manufacturing report.

“I have no deadline,” Trump told reporters Tuesday in London when asked if he wanted an agreement by year end. Stocks fell.

The U.S. president suggested that in some ways, it might be better to wait until after the November election.

The following are the views of a number of market participants on what happens if the tariffs on China kick in Dec. 15.

It will be “definitely risk-off across the screen,” Tongli Han, chief investment officer at Deepblue Global Investment, said in an interview with Bloomberg TV. “What happened recently makes this trade deal more costly for Chinese leaders — so I’m seeing a gloomy future for the short term, one-to-two months.”

With the clock running down on 2019 and a prospects of a trade deal looking more remote it’s time for investors to take a little bit of risk off the table, said Steve Brice, chief investment strategist at Standard Chartered private bank, on Bloomberg TV.

“It looks like it’s going to be pushed to the beginning of next year at the best case,” Brice said. The message to investors is “maybe trim a little bit of equity exposure, or certainly not chase the market at this stage. But look to do so in the next few weeks if we see a 5-to-7% pullback.”

Longer term, Brice remains optimistic “the U.S. and China will still strike a deal of some sort. That will reduce uncertainty and help the global economy do well.”

For Kerry Craig, global market strategist at JPMorgan Asset Management, a key concern is markets have already priced in the prospect of a trade deal that has yet to be signed.

“There had been a lot of optimism built in around a trade deal and it’s still the thing that will weigh on markets over the coming months,” Craig said on Bloomberg TV. “In the meantime we need to see more of a pick-up in the global economy to really offset some of those uncertainties.”

For some, the retreat in equities at the start of the week already presents a buying opportunity.

“I’d fade the correction today,” Eli Lee, head of investment strategy at Bank of Singapore, told Bloomberg TV.

The renewed tariff pressures on South America and Europe are likely an effort to bolster Trump’s “tariff man” image ahead of a trade deal with China, he said.

“With the economy in a very delicate situation, if this came on, it would seriously ratchet up the risk of a recession — and the White House wouldn’t want this situation going into the 2020 presidential election next year,” Lee said.

There may be some massive initial market swings in store, said Chris Weston, head of research at Pepperstone Group Ltd. in a note to clients.

“We could face a wild day,” he said. The S&P 500 is likely to fall about 2%, with currencies including the yuan, Australian dollar and Korean won also likely to move, he said. A relief rally may be in the offing afterward, particularly if there’s agreement to revisit talks in 2020, he said.

“Even if there is a trade deal, it doesn’t solve most of the issues that we still have with China,” which is something that markets are going to have to reflect in time, said Christopher Smart, chief global strategist at Barings Investment Institute, on Bloomberg TV. “In fact, it probably makes the relationship more difficult to manage, because we’ve taken tariffs off the table.”

Smart said “time is running out” to get a deal done this year, given the logistics involved in setting up a presidential meeting. What does offer solace is that global central banks have eased policy and injected liquidity, postponing the recession that investors had been worrying about, he said.

“We would hope that a bout of common sense breaks out,” Philip Shaw, chief economist at Investec, told Bloomberg TV. “Don’t forget that this situation is very volatile — it swings to and fro. We wouldn’t interpret too strongly events of one day.”

Theeranat Rujimethapass, president of TISCO Asset Management Co, said the SSF was a new product of the Finance Ministry in promoting long-term investment among the middle and low income groups.

“It would not lead to a sudden inflows of fund into the market, it would take time as it is not attractive as LTF,” he said.

Under the SSF, investors must hold their investment units for up to 10 years, compared with 5 years for LTF. Investment in SSF is limited at Bt200,000 a year while the investment limit in LTF was set at Bt500,000.

Young investors may prefer SSF as there is no minimum requirement, nor is annual investment required. Those who invested in retirement mutual fund(RMF) may migrate to SSF, he said.

Investment conditions and tax incentives for RMF and SSF do not differ significantly, those who do not want to make an annual investment would prefer SSF, he added.

The Finance Ministry has revised tax incentives for RMF, limiting total tax deduction to no more than Bt500,000 a year including the tax incentives of SSF and other pensions.

Total tax deduction under the old schemes was capped at Bt1 million.

Kobsidthi Silpachai, head of capital markets research at Kasikornbank said most people would still invest in the new fund since there is not a lot of tax shields available, adding that” people will take whatever tax shield they can get their hands on”.

Analysts at the Stock Exchange of Thailand(SET) said they will calculate the impact of SSF and release the findings.

Earlier, Pakorn Peetathawatchai, president of SET, voiced concerns over liquidity if investors had to hold the investment for up to 10 years.

Trump said he may wait until after the 2020 election to strike a trade agreement with China, saying there is “no deadline” on the talks. “In some ways I like the idea of waiting until after the election for the China deal,” he said from London, where he is attending a NATO summit. The comments followed his announcement, via Twitter, that he is restoring tariffs on steel and aluminum imports from Brazil and Argentina. And his administration separately said it is considering new levies on a range of French goods in retaliation for a new digital tax.

The consequences could reach well beyond the metals trade between the United States and its erstwhile South American economic allies and higher prices on French wine and makeup. For one, it signals Trump still views new tariffs as an effective lever to advance his trade agenda, a belief packed with peril for the markets broadly, and manufacturers and retailers in particular, among others.

These are our big takeaways from Trump’s announcements:

1. The escalation of trade hostilities marks a serious U-turn by the administration.

Trump’s team appeared to be winding down its trade fights in recent weeks, quietly foregoing tariffs on European auto imports, allowing American companies to continue doing business with Chinese telecom giant Huawei, and canceling a tariff hike on Chinese goods planned for October while working toward “phase one” trade deal with Beijing.

But the confrontations the administration just launched could widen trade showdowns in both Asia and Europe.

At issue in France, according to a Washington Post report, is “a 3% tax France introduced last year, which the administration says would unfairly target America’s digital economy icons. French lawmakers call the levy ‘Les GAFA’ – an acronym for Google, Amazon, Facebook and Apple, companies that French officials accuse of paying insufficient taxes on revenue earned in France. . . Administration officials worry that the French tax could set a precedent for other countries. [U.S. Trade Representative Robert] Lighthizer said he may open investigations into similar taxes in Austria, Italy and Turkey.” Lighthizer proposed striking back by levying tariffs of up to 100 percent on $2.4 billion of French products, including cheese, porcelain and handbags.

Trump’s moves against Brazil and Argentina “took officials in both countries by surprise,” the report said.. “In a sign of how abruptly Trump had acted, his own administration was unprepared to provide details.”

2. Don’t expect a Christmas calm for the markets.

Stock market investors have largely priced in progress toward a trade truce between the United States and China. They have been counting on a deal to scuttle new import levies Trump is set to impose on $160 billion of Chinese goods on Dec. 15 – and they have been betting the president would see it through in part to put the market on sounder footing heading into his reelection campaign.

But the president’s renewed fight with Argentina and Brazil throws the assumption into doubt, a fact reflected in a Monday stock market sell-off. The Washington Post reported: “The record bull run of the past month flamed out, with the Dow Jones industrial average declining 268 points, or .95%, to close at 27,783. The Standard & Poor’s 500 index dropped 27 points, or .86%, to close at 3,113. The tech-laden Nasdaq composite was hit particularly hard, finishing at 8,567, a 97-point drop of 1.1%.”

Chris Krueger of Cowen Washington Research Group said Trump’s latest turn points to one of his central conflicts. “The id and ego of Trump (in our opinion) is Dow Man vs. Tariff Man,” he wrote in a note. “Tariffs remain Trump’s primary trade security blanket and what he reverts to when he feels aggrieved.”

3. Trump is turning the trade war into a currency war.

The president, in announcing the renewed metals tariffs, accused Brazil and Argentina of devaluing their currencies to make their exports more competitive. The claim, for which there is no evidence, is “very different from what Trump said in 2018, when he first imposed tariffs on steel and aluminum imports, and it marks the latest unpredictable trade shock from the White House as business leaders are begging for more certainty,” The Washington Post reported.

Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross underlined the wider threat the decision poses in a Fox Business interview. Brazil, he said, is not “the only one where there are currency issues.”

From The Post’s report: “Now Trump is showing a willingness to impose tariffs for yet another reason: currency moves, opening the door to more action, potentially against China. . . Trump has long railed against China for purposefully devaluing its currency and even promised to label China a “currency manipulator” as soon as he took office (something he eventually did in August 2019). Ross went out of his way on Fox Business to say China appeared to be doing better now. Still, the threat is hanging out there that other nations could be next.”

4. Trump promised the trade war would revive manufacturing. It isn’t working.

Indeed, manufacturing is in a recession, and it’s getting worse. “U.S. factory activity contracted for a fourth straight month in November as new orders slumped back to around their lowest level since 2012, while construction spending fell in October, tempering optimism over the economy that had been

fanned by a recent run of upbeat reports,” Reuters’ Lucia Mutikani reports.

This means the Bt1,000 handout and the ‘cash-back’ amount will not come into calculation for tax payment. The government spent a budget of Bt19 billion to fund the three phases of the campaign, spokeswoman Narumon Pinyosinwat said.

In the first two phases of the campaign, each registrant was given Bt1,000 and the ‘cash back’ perk while the third phase offered only cash rebate.

Lavaron Sangsnit, director-general of the Fiscal Policy Office and Finance Ministry spokesman, said recently that from the start of the campaign on September 27 to November 28, 11,761,099 people had registered under three phases with combined spending of Bt16.535 billion.

Financial festival organiser executive Pakanee Viriyarungsarit said people from the east side of Bangkok, including Samut Prakarn, Chachoengsao and Chon Buri, participated in the event and invested vigorously. The four-day fest witnessed investments from 27,400 applicants among 150,000 visitors.

Home loans and refinancing held the highest interest with Bt6.8 billion, after the government introduced its “Baan dee mee down” (Good house with down payment) scheme. The government will offer support in the form of Bt50,000 cash rebate from a down payment for taxpayers earning less than Bt100,000 a month.

SMEs loans came in second with Bt4.4 billion, while life insurance and saving funds of Bt2.1 billion gained the third highest interest, being the most favourable insurance saving programme in the short term, offering a payment period of 5-7 years and 10-year coverage with the internal rate of return being 2.20-3.25 per cent.

Savings lottery came in fourth with Bt700 million, followed by mutual funds of Bt120 million, the most favourable being LTF & RMF.

Pakanee said there were around 2,000 participants who registered for retails loans and 3,700 credit card registrants.

The Cabinet approved the Finance Ministry’s proposal on the new tax scheme, Finance Minister Uttama Savanayana said after a Cabinet meeting on Tuesday.

Individual investors have to hold their units for 10 years and when they sell they are exempted from personal income tax.

The SSF will replace the long-term equity fund (LTF), which is due to expire by the end of this year.

For the SSF, tax deductions will increase up to 30 per cent of personal income but are limited to Bt200,000 a year. Individuals will get total tax deductions of not more than Bt500,000 a year, including from retirement mutual funds (RMF), provident fund, insurance policies and other types of pension funds.

The ministry does not require a minimum investment or that the investment should be made every year.

Tax deductions will be applied between 2020 and 2024, after that the Finance Ministry will review the deductions, he said.

Tax deductions for existing RMF is also revised, said Uttama.

These deductions will increase from 15 per cent of income to 30 per cent. But total tax privileges will be limited to Bt500,000 a year, including tax deductions from SSF and other types of pension funds. A minimum investment is not required. Investors however have to invest every year. But if they do not make an investment one year, their tax deductions rights for the following years of investment will remain.

“The new tax deduction scheme has been designed to support middle and lower income groups, giving them more investment and savings opportunities,” said Uttama.

He said that although tax deductions for LTF will expire in the next few weeks, investors will still get personal income tax exemptions when they sell their LTFs.

The total amount of new tax deductions is less than the former LTF and RMF – investors could get up to Bt500,000 for LTF, while the old RMF and other pension funds limited investment to Bt500,000. These old schemes have been criticised as benefiting rich people the most.

The forecast is based on the assumption that the baht stays at around 33 per US dollar.

Exports in October shrank 4.5 per cent year on year to $20.75 billion (Bt627.1 billion), while imports contracted 7.6 per cent year on year to $20.25 billion, the statement added.