US and China reignite trade war with focus on rare earths and tariffs
Written by Black Hot Fire Network on October 12, 2025
Donald Trump, who had been notably conciliatory with his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, since the start of his second term, posted a fiery message on Friday, October 10, on his Truth Social platform: threats of additional tariffs and the possible cancellation of the summit scheduled for late October in Asia – everything was on the table. “I was to meet President Xi in two weeks, at APEC [Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation], in South Korea, but now there seems to be no reason to do so,” wrote Trump, adding, “One of the Policies that we are calculating at this moment is a massive increase of Tariffs on Chinese products coming into the United States of America.”
That afternoon, Trump specified that he might impose an additional 100% tariff on Chinese imports and introduce controls on the use in China of certain advanced US-made software – a likely reference to software used in microprocessor design. The announcement triggered a sharp drop on Wall Street (down 2.7%), especially among tech stocks (down 3.56%). It revived fears of a return to escalation in the trade war between the world’s two largest economies, reminiscent of the tensions that marked the spring.
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