Trump's steel tariff threat hammers related stocks; Nifty Metal falls 3%

Steel tariff Trump news: US President Donald Trump may announce a 25-per cent tariff across all the imports of steel and aluminum as early as Monday

Steel stocks, Trump steel import: Investors were seen selling stocks of steel companies in India stock markets on Monday, February 10, 2025. The selling came after news reports suggested that US President Donald Trump could announce a blanket 25-per cent tariff on steel imports.

 

At 9:50 AM, the Nifty Metal index was the top loser on the National Stock Exchange (NSE) today as it traded 2.7 per cent lower at 8,348. Among individual stocks, Vedanta share price was down 4.4 per cent, SAIL (Steel Authority of India) was down 4 per cent, Tata Steel 3.27 per cent, Jindal Steel 2.9 per cent, JSW Steel 2.8 per cent, National Aluminium Company (Nalco) 2.5 per cent, and Hindalco 2.49 per cent.

 

 

NMDC, Hindustan Copper, Jindal Stainless, Welspun Corporation, APL Apollo Tubes, Adani Enterprises, and Ratnamani Metals were trading with losses in the range of 0.2 per cent to 2.5 per cent. By comparison, the NSE Nifty index was quoting 130 points (0.55 per cent) weak.

 

According to reports, US President Donald Trump may announce a 25-per cent tariff across all the imports of steel and aluminum as early as Monday. 

 

On Sunday, Trump told reporters that the levied tariffs would cover “everybody”, without specifying when the duties would come into effect.

 

Trump, further, said he would announce more retaliatory tariffs on "Tuesday or Wednesday" which would take effect "almost immediately" after the announcement. This also hit investor sentiment.

 

As per a Bloomberg report, the US imports aluminium, mostly from Canada, the United Arab Emirates and China.

 

Notably, Canada and Mexico are two of the US's biggest steel trading partners, the countries involved in border and immigrant war with the US.

 

The two countries faced similar threats earlier this month when Trump threatened to impose import duties of 25 per cent on Canadian and Mexican products due to illegal immigrants. He, later, delayed that plan for 30 days – until early March - after speaking to the leaders of both countries.

 

Remember, during his first term, Donald Trump has imposed tariffs of 25 per cent on steel imports and 10 per cent on aluminium imports from Canada, Mexico and the European Union.

 

But the US reached a deal a year later with Canada and Mexico to end those tariffs, although the EU import taxes remained in place until 2021, as per reports.

 

Meanwhile, China’s hot-rolled coil (HRC) export prices remain flat month-on-month (MoM) in December, after a 6 per cent decline in November. Steel prices in North Europe, Japan, and the US dropped by around 1 per cent M-o-M, 2 per cent M-o-M, and 5 per cent M-o-M, respectively.

 

In India, primary long product prices as well as the HRC prices fell by 3 per cent M-o-M each in December.

 

Further, till mid-January, HRC and primary long product prices were down around 1 per cent each vs the December average.