Business
Trump’s China tariff talk clouds IMF, World Bank meetings | The Express Tribune
Finance chiefs gathering in Washington this week were ready to discuss the global economy’s surprising resilience in the face of Donald Trump’s tariff assaults – until US-China trade war rhetoric reignited with the US president threatening 100% duties on Chinese imports and whipsawing financial markets, Reuters reported.
The annual meetings of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank are now certain to be dominated by questions over whether Trump’s vow to retaliate against China’s dramatically expanded export controls on rare earths will plunge the world’s two largest economies back into a full-blown trade war.
Trump’s said his new tariffs and export curbs would take effect on November 1 and threatened to cancel a meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping later this month in South Korea. The duties would shatter a delicate truce crafted by Washington and Beijing over five months that brought tariffs down from triple-digit levels and prompted improved IMF global growth forecasts.
US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on Monday sought to walk back the threat, telling Fox Business Network that he believed the Trump-Xi meeting would proceed and that there would be US-China staff-level meetings this week on the sidelines of the IMF and World Bank gathering.
“The 100% tariff does not have to happen,” Bessent said. “The relationship, despite this announcement last week, is good. Lines of communication have reopened, so we’ll see where it goes.”
Bessent added that the US would “stand firm” against the new global Chinese rare earths export controls, while Trump said on the Truth Social media site on Sunday: “Don’t worry about China, it will all be fine!”
The softer tone sparked a strong rebound in US stocks at the start of trading in New York on Monday, with the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite index up more than 2% and other major indexes up more than 1%.
Martin Muehleisen, a former IMF strategy chief who is now with the Atlantic Council, said Trump’s threats may be posturing for negotiating leverage, but said they will inject volatility into the week’s proceedings.
While China has some leverage over Trump due to its global dominance in rare earths, which are essential for tech manufacturing, Muehleisen said it is not in Beijing’s interest to plunge back into an environment of triple-digit tariffs.
Prior to the escalation on Friday, IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva had touted the global economy’s ability to withstand multiple shocks, from tariff costs and uncertainty to a slowing US job market, rising debt levels and rapid shifts brought on by AI’s rapid adoption.
In a preview of the IMF’s World Economic Outlook forecasts due on Tuesday, Georgieva said last week that the global GDP growth rate for 2025 would be only slightly less than the 3.3% for 2024. Based on tariff rates that were lower than initially feared – including the US-China duties – the IMF in July raised its 2025 GDP growth forecast by two-tenths of a percentage point to 3.0%.
Finance ministers from the Group of Seven industrial democracies are expected to meet on Wednesday to discuss efforts to step up sanctions pressure on Russia that is aimed at ending Moscow’s war against Ukraine.
A British government source said that finance minister Rachel Reeves wanted to ensure joint action with G7 and European Union countries to cut Russia’s energy revenues and access to overseas assets that comply with international law.
Among these options that G7 ministers will discuss is a European Union plan to use Russian frozen sovereign assets to back a loan of 140 billion euros ($162 billion) to Ukraine.
The US footprint at the meetings will be large, extending from tariff discussions to Bessent’s calls for the IMF and World Bank to pull back from climate and gender issues to focus on their core missions of financial stability and development.
Muehleisen, the former IMF official, said the Fund risks being pushed by its largest shareholder to enforce Trump’s geopolitical goals – ratcheting up pressure on China and potentially extending more aid to US allies like Argentina without adequate reforms.
“Is it really still a global, multilateral organisation, or is it becoming a bit more of an appendage of the US Treasury?” he said
Business
Stock Market Live Updates: Sensex, Nifty Hit Record Highs; Bank Nifty Climbs 60,000 For The First Time
Stock Market News Live Updates: Indian equity benchmarks opened with a strong gap-up on Monday, December 1, touching fresh record highs, buoyed by a sharp acceleration in Q2FY26 GDP growth to a six-quarter peak of 8.2%. Positive cues from Asian markets further lifted investor sentiment.
The BSE Sensex was trading at 85,994, up 288 points or 0.34%, after touching an all-time high of 86,159 in early deals. The Nifty 50 stood at 26,290, higher by 87 points or 0.33%, after scaling a record intraday high of 26,325.8.
Broader markets also saw gains, with the Midcap index rising 0.27% and the Smallcap index advancing 0.52%.
On the sectoral front, the Nifty Bank hit a historic milestone by crossing the 60,000 mark for the first time, gaining 0.4% to touch a fresh peak of 60,114.05.
Meanwhile, the Metal and PSU Bank indices climbed 0.8% each in early trade.
Global cues
Asia-Pacific markets were mostly lower on Monday as traders assessed fresh Chinese manufacturing data and increasingly priced in the likelihood of a US Federal Reserve rate cut later this month.
According to the CME FedWatch Tool, markets are now assigning an 87.4 per cent probability to a rate cut at the Fed’s December 10 meeting.
China’s factory activity unexpectedly slipped back into contraction in November, with the RatingDog China General Manufacturing PMI by S&P Global easing to 49.9, below expectations of 50.5, as weak domestic demand persisted.
Japan’s Nikkei 225 slipped 1.6 per cent, while the broader Topix declined 0.86 per cent. In South Korea, the Kospi dropped 0.30 per cent and Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 was down 0.31 per cent.
US stock futures were steady in early Asian trade after a positive week on Wall Street. On Friday, in a shortened post-Thanksgiving session, the Nasdaq Composite climbed 0.65 per cent to 23,365.69, its fifth consecutive day of gains.
The S&P 500 rose 0.54 per cent to 6,849.09, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average added 289.30 points, or 0.61 per cent, to close at 47,716.42.
Osmond ChiaBusiness reporter
Getty ImagesSouth Korea’s largest online retailer, Coupang, has apologised for a massive data breach potentially involving nearly 34 million local customer accounts.
The country’s internet authority said that it is investigating the breach and that details from the millions of accounts have likely been exposed.
Coupang is often described as South Korea’s equivalent of Amazon.com. The breach marks the latest in a series of data leaks at major firms in the country, including its telecommunications giant, SK Telecom.
Coupang told the BBC it became aware of the unauthorised access of personal data of about 4,500 customer accounts on 18 November and immediately reported it to the authorities.
But later checks found that some 33.7 million customer accounts – all in South Korea – were likely exposed, said Coupang, adding that the breach is believed to have begun as early as June through a server based overseas.
The exposed data is limited to name, email address, phone number, shipping address and some order histories, Coupang said.
No credit card information or login credentials were leaked. Those details remain securely protected and no action is required from Coupang users at this point, the firm added.
The number of accounts affected by the incident represents more than half of South Korea’s roughly-52 million population.
Coupang, which is founded in South Korea and headquartered in the US, said recently that it had nearly 25 million active users.
Coupang apologised to its customers and warned them to stay alert to scams impersonating the company.
The firm did not give details on who is behind the breach.
South Korean media outlets reported on Sunday that a former Coupang employee from China was suspected of being behind the breach.
The authorities are assessing the scale of the breach as well as whether Coupang had broken any data protection safety rules, South Korea’s Ministry of Science and ICT said in a statement.
“As the breach involves the contact details and addresses of a large number of citizens, the Commission plans to conduct a swift investigation and impose strict sanctions if it finds a violation of the duty to implement safety measures under the Protection Act.”
The incident marks the latest in a series of breaches affecting major South Korean companies this year, despite the country’s reputation for stringent data privacy rules.
SK Telecom, South Korea’s largest mobile operator, was fined nearly $100m (£76m) over a data breach involving more than 20 million subscribers.
In September, Lotte Cards also said the data of nearly three million customers was leaked after a cyber-attack on the credit card firm.
Agency workers hired to cover Birmingham bin strikers will join them on picket lines on Monday, a union has said.
A rally will be held by Unite The Union at Smithfield Depot on Pershore Street, Birmingham, on Monday morning to mark the first day of strike action by agency refuse workers.
Unite said the Job & Talent agency workers had voted in favour of strike action “over bullying, harassment and the threat of blacklisting at the council’s refuse department two weeks ago”.
The union said the number of agency workers who will join the strike action is “growing daily”.
Strikes by directly-employed bin workers, which have been running since January, could continue beyond May’s local elections.
The directly-employed bin workers voted in favour of extending their industrial action mandate earlier this month.
Unite general secretary Sharon Graham said: “Birmingham council will only resolve this dispute when it stops the appalling treatment of its workforce.
“Agency workers have now joined with directly-employed staff to stand up against the massive injustices done to them.
“Instead of wasting millions more of council taxpayers’ money fighting a dispute it could settle justly for a fraction of the cost, the council needs to return to talks with Unite and put forward a fair deal for all bin workers.
“Strikes will not end until it does.”
Stock Market Live Updates: Sensex, Nifty Hit Record Highs; Bank Nifty Climbs 60,000 For The First Time
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