Economic Briefing Tariff Update At the time of writing a Federal Court had ruled that the reciprocal tariffs imposed by the Trump Administration under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act of 1977 were illegal and ordered the immediate reversal of those orders. The ruling was being appealed and will likely end up at the Supreme…

Economic Briefing Tariff Update At the time of writing, the first trade deal was yet to be announced. Rumors suggested that any number of countries might be close to announcing a tentative agreement (an agreement in principle or signed letter of agreement) and those could include India, South Korea, Japan, Mexico, and others. Dozens of…

Economic Briefing April 2nd Reciprocal Tariffs Hit – But Uncertainty Might Continue to a Degree There is a lot of uncertainty in the rules and applications of the new US tariff policy, but it looks like there will be a 10% tariff imposed on all trading partners which will go into effect on April 5th.…

Economic Briefing Q1 GDP Estimates Plummet as Concerns Over Tariffs and Layoffs Weighs on Investment The Atlanta Fed GDPNow estimates have fallen sharply in the last several weeks. This measure tracks economic releases throughout the quarter and keeps a running tally of Gross Domestic Product. After showing Q1 growing at nearly 2.3% early in the…

Economic Briefing Tariff Risk and Relative Impacts At the time of writing, 25% tariffs on Canada and Mexico were on hold for thirty days pending negotiations and some actions that were going to be taken by both Canada and Mexico in response to Trump Administration demands. China has taken an additional 10% increase in tariffs…

Transportation Briefing Talks to Resume on East and Gulf Coast Ports on Tuesday, January 7th Although no progress has been reported, the ILA and USMX are expected to resume talks on Tuesday, January 7th. The contract deadline is looming (on January 15th ), and the parties are still stuck on differences between the use of automation…

Economic Briefing What Could Tariffs Do to Inflation and Trade? Tariffs have been used by administrations for centuries. Recently, with the emerging strength of modern manufacturing techniques that drive the cost of production lower, sensitivities to price imbalances are high. Starting really under the Obama Administration, the use of tariffs has been a popular move…

Economic Briefing Supply Chains Largely Back in Cycle Over the past 24 months, the global supply chain has been hit with significant overstocks (stemming from the supply chain crisis in 2021 and 2022 which led to “just-in-case” inventory strategies leading to overstocks). The US business Inventory to Sales Ratio has returned to levels (on average)…