China doesn't want Russia to lose this war, likely won't put pressure on Putin: Brookings
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Business Insider
an hour ago
- Business Insider
A CEO explains the sourcing strategy that helped a battery chain lessen its China reliance amid the trade war
After Donald Trump imposed tariffs on Chinese goods during his first term as president in 2018, Scott Williams had a problem. He was CEO of Batteries Plus, a retailer that imported around one-third of its inventory from China. The chain sells batteries that power cars and other electronics at about 740 mostly franchised locations across the US. Trump's 25% tariff on certain Chinese goods, which escalated the US-China trade war, raised costs for Williams. That's when Williams decided to make a long-term change: He started buying products from as many sources as possible other than China. Seven years later, he told Business Insider that he's lowered the share of materials his company buys from China from 32% down to 4%. As Trump's trade war continues in his second term, Williams said Batteries Plus' decreased reliance on products from China has prevented much of the scrambling that Trump's tariffs have caused at other companies this year. Batteries Plus turned to the US, Malaysia, and Vietnam While some companies and investors are fretting over Trump's latest August 1 deadline for hiking tariffs on imports from several countries, including China, Batteries Plus has a diversified supplier base that it said insulates it from some of these pressures. "That has obviously, in hindsight, proven to be a huge benefit for us," Williams said. Batteries Plus found factories in other countries to replace what it previously imported from China. One challenge was finding equivalents produced outside China that were of the same quality, Williams said. Car batteries that the retailer produces under its own X2 brand, for instance, now come from Malaysia and Vietnam because Batteries Plus was able to find suppliers in those countries that matched what their China-based suppliers could make. "You're very careful to ensure that, because quality is your reputation," Williams said. Batteries Plus didn't rely on a single country to replace what it used to import from China. Of the 32% that came from China in 2018, about 12 percentage points now come from Vietnam, 8 from US sources, 5 from Malaysia, and the rest from a handful of other countries. That distribution was deliberate, Williams said, so that the company could shift between suppliers in the future depending on which countries are hit by tariffs. "My strategy was, I'm going to diversify with key partners so that I can press the brake or the accelerator on different countries as this thing moves," he said. The 4% of Batteries Plus' supplies that still come from China use minerals that the company hasn't been able to find good sources for elsewhere, he said. The supply chain strategy has not completely shielded Batteries Plus from tariffs. The Trump administration is targeting a longer list of countries with duties than it did seven years ago. Earlier this month, for instance, Trump announced a trade deal with Vietnam that would subject imports from that country to a 20% tariff, up from the current 10%. Still, source diversification has helped Batteries Plus avoid some of the biggest tariff hikes during Trump's second term. Tariffs on imports from China briefly rose to 145% this spring, dinging profit at companies from Dollar Tree to Cracker Barrel. Williams said that Batteries Plus wants to pass less than half of the cost of new tariffs to customers — and, for some products, "none at all," he said. Batteries Plus has also used other cost-cutting options to minimize price increases. The company has increased automation at its warehouses to increase efficiency and negotiated with suppliers to minimize the cost of tariffs, Williams said.
Newsweek
an hour ago
- Newsweek
Russia Issues Nuclear Warning After Trump's Weapons for Ukraine Plan
Based on facts, either observed and verified firsthand by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources. Newsweek AI is in beta. Translations may contain inaccuracies—please refer to the original content. Russia has issued a nuclear warning to the West following President Donald Trump's announcement that the U.S. and NATO allies will supply advanced weapons to Ukraine. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told TASS, a Russian state-owned news agency, that Russia's nuclear doctrine remains in effect. "Russia's nuclear doctrine remains in effect, and thus, all its provisions continue to apply," President Vladimir Putin's spokesman told a TASS reporter in response to a question about whether the clause remains applicable that deems it an act of aggression when a nuclear-armed state incites a non-nuclear state to act against Russia. This is a breaking news story. Updates to follow.
Yahoo
an hour ago
- Yahoo
Trump's sanctions on Russia would be ‘extremely painful' for US and risk global oil price spike, experts warn
New sanctions that Donald Trump has threatened to impose on Russia if Moscow does not agree to a Ukraine peace deal within 50 days would be 'extremely painful' for the US itself, industry experts have warned. In a renewed attempt to force Vladimir Putin to accept an elusive peace deal with Ukraine, the US president on Monday threatened to impose so-called 'secondary tariffs' of 100 per cent on countries which continue to do trade with Russia. This would mean countries such as India, China and Turkey would face heavy tariffs with Washington as a result of buying Russian oil. The move would seek to remove Russian oil – one of the most crucial sources of income for Moscow's wartime economy – from global markets. 'It would definitely hit Russia. It would destroy Russian oil trade, but would be extremely painful for the United States also,' said Alexander Kolyandr, Russian economy expert and senior fellow at the Center for European Policy Analysis. Trump's sanctions on Russia would be 'extremely painful' for US and risk global oil price spike, warns expert (REUTERS) But Mr Kolyandr doubts Mr Trump will follow through with the tariffs in their proposed form. If such sanctions were imposed, he said, they would be 'pretty painful for oil prices' worldwide and would impact European countries, including the United Kingdom, as well. 'Russia accounts for 5 million barrels a day of oil export, and there is nowhere to get those 5 million fast enough to prevent a spike in oil prices,' he explained. Increasing oil prices would subsequently cause inflation to be pushed up, he added. Despite cutting financial ties with Russia, Western countries have so far avoided steps preventing Russia from selling oil elsewhere due to these risks – meaning Moscow has continued to earn hundreds of billions of dollars by shipping oil to other buyers. India and China, the two largest growing economies in Asia, have only expressed general concerns about the loss of life in the Ukraine war while continuing to ramp up their trade with Russia. New Delhi in particular has profited from the conflict by buying vast amounts of cheap Russian oil. From meeting less than 2 per cent of India's oil needs before the war, Russia has become the country's largest supplier of seaborne crude. The cheap availability of Russian oil since the invasion has led India to gradually reduce its reliance on its traditional top suppliers – Iraq and Saudi Arabia. Narendra Taneja, an energy expert based in India, said Mr Trump's unilateral sanctions would not only hurt the likes of India, China and Brazil but upend the global oil market, calling it a 'high-stakes gamble'. 'Oil prices will go up for everyone – including the US and Western Europe,' he told The Independent. 'If that happens, it would be bad news for the world economy, including Nato members and other countries. If the agenda is to punish one country, it ends up punishing the entire world.' Given the damage to the American and global economies, Mr Kolyandr does not believe it likely that Mr Trump will impose the tariffs in the form which he has threatened. 'The United States is quite reluctant to forfeit all its trade with China. It also needs India as a potential ally against China, and Turkey is a Nato member and one of America's allies in the Near East, so I don't see how that might be possible [for Trump to impose the tariffs].' Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov met his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi in Beijing on Monday (RUSSIAN FOREIGN MINISTRY / HANDO) But, he said, the main danger for Moscow is the 'unpredictability' of the US president, who during his first six months in power has been erratic in his attitude towards both Kyiv and Moscow. 'Moscow business should be worried, simply because nobody understands what might happen after 50 days,' he said. Mr Trump announced the tariffs while speaking in the Oval Office on Monday during a meeting with Nato secretary-general Mark Rutte, declaring he was 'very unhappy' with Russia and its president Vladimir Putin, and pledged to impose what he described as 'very severe tariffs' on Moscow. The US president's hardened stance against Moscow came along with a softening of his relationship with Kyiv, as he committed a new batch of offensive and defensive weapons to support its defence against Russian aggression. On Tuesday, he said that the first Patriot air defence systems – which are being paid for by Kyiv's European allies – were already on their way to Ukraine. Vaibhav Raghunanda, an analyst at the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA), suggested that if Mr Trump really wanted to help Kyiv and diminish Vladimir Putin's war chest he should crack down on loopholes in the US's existing sanctions regime. CREA estimates that potentially hundreds of millions of American dollars are still reaching Russia in the form of crude oil exports because the US allows third countries to import Russian crude, refine it, and then export those products to America. 'Bans and sanctions on refineries using Russian crude will not just disincentivise this trade but also lead to a severe drop off in the price of Russian crude itself. By the US closing the refining loophole and banning the importation of oil products from refineries running on Russian crude, the US could cut off $750m in Kremlin tax revenues,' he told The Independent. Solve the daily Crossword
