Good morning. One of the reasons the US is imposing import taxes — tariffs — is that it hopes to encourage domestic manufacturing. The logic is that making imports more expensive encourages investment in domestic production that will ultimately displace those imports. This brings us to the US’s new export taxes on advanced semiconductors sold to China. Treasury secretary Scott Bessent says they may be extended to other sectors. By the same logic, shouldn’t export taxes encourage other countries to invest in domestic production that will displace imports from the US? Are we missing something here? Email us: unhedged@ft.com.
Treasuries’ eerie calm
It has not been an especially calm spring and summer for the economy: growth expectations have fallen, inflation has edged up, tariff policy has vacillated, and the president has lobbed rhetorical hand grenades, and worse, at the central bank and Bureau of Labor Statistics.