Aurelia Butler

Unlock the White House Watch newsletter for freeYour guide to what the 2024 US election means for Washington and the worldWe should trust in Donald Trump’s instincts, says Mike Johnson, Speaker of the House of Representatives. Alternatively, Johnson and his caucus should run screaming in the opposite direction. It is too late for Republicans to revert to being a normal party — belief in Trump is their organising principle. But they could play the loyalist by coaxing Trump off the ledge. In addition to their jobs, the future of the global economy, and every American’s retirement fund, depends on it. Their task is complicated by the fact that Trump still thinks he is on to a winner. Try to stand in his shoes. From his 2011 Obama foreign birth conspiracy to his 2024 conviction as a felon, and so many points in between, Trump has almost annually been left for dead. But his phoenix keeps rising. Trump is a fantasist whose deepest-lodged fantasy — that he is an unstoppable champion — keeps coming true. Why would a little market turmoil stop him?The starting point is that Trump is a hammer and the rest of the world, as well as half of America, is a nail. Sometimes the hammer can focus on select nails, or soften its blow, but he is always a hammer. That some of Trump’s closest backers, such as the New York hedge fund manager Bill Ackman, are surprised by his global tariff war is a mystery. Trump vowed in almost every single campaign speech to unleash the trade war we are now in. He has been blaming foreigners for ripping off America since the mid-1980s. Note, his obsession was with Japan, not the Soviet Union. Trump has always been angriest with allies and friends. His deepest contempt is now reserved for Europe and Canada. Psychologists extrapolate from the estate settlement Trump tried to impose on his own siblings. If your instinct is to rip people off, including those closest to you, assume that is everyone’s method.The mystery is why so many — from Ackman’s fellow billionaires to Florida-based Venezuelans — have bent over backwards to miss who Trump is. A trillion comments have been wasted accusing the wrong people of Trump derangement syndrome. The real TDS afflicts those who keep seeing a rational actor, or an economic chess game, where none exists. The whole market arguably suffers from this syndrome. Shortly after plummeting on Monday morning, a fake news release surfaced that said Trump would announce a pause on his tariffs this week. The markets more than erased their opening losses. All those gains, in turn, were wiped out when the White House issued a denial.If an online meme can turn a bear market into a bull recovery in the space of a minute, and back again, Trump has the world in his palm. The merest rumour that he might be sane can trigger a buying frenzy. Roman emperors would envy the finger-crooking sway of one man. Yet at some point, possibly imminent, Trump could be forced to pause at least some of his “liberation day” duties. That will trigger a big relief rally. But his pause will be no surer than stray driftwood. The same might apply to his threats of a new 50 per cent tariff escalation on China.Markets will cheer any hints of bilateral deals Trump plans to strike with more influential demandeurs — Japan, China and India should be closely watched. Investors should also pay heed to the fact that such deals will be struck between foreign governments and Trump personally, not his administration. The departments of Treasury, commerce and the US trade representatives are often out of the loop. Given the lack of boundary between Trump’s public role and private investments, the scope for non-trade-related bartering is great.The idea that Trump’s impact will be limited to the goods-traded economy is also wishful thinking. Foreigners own a critical share of US Treasury debt. Continued high demand for an asset in whose issuer the world is losing trust is the difference between a Trump recession and a Trump depression. On this, Europe’s governments seem to have better instincts than the equity and fixed-income markets. Rather than escalate the trade war, the EU is mulling only a modest toolkit of retaliations. This is not because Brussels thinks Trump is likely to embrace comity. It is because it fears a tit-for-tat trade spiral will break the global financial system. Either way, this teachable moment is needlessly belated. Trump’s sane-washers have forfeited their credibility. There is no school of foreign policy realism, or trade mercantilism, that could explain Trump’s actions. If you want to forecast the world, study his psychology. While Trump is in charge, stay short on [email protected] More

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.The EU and China should work to reach a “negotiated resolution” to provide “stability and predictability” for the global economy in the face of US tariffs, European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen has said after a call with China’s Premier Li Qiang.US President Donald Trump has roiled global financial markets with his announcement of sweeping tariffs, prompting China and the EU to table retaliatory measures that risk a full-blown global trade conflict.Brussels officials want to ensure co-operation with Beijing as they aim to contain any escalation and limit the damage to the European economy, given the huge size of their respective markets and the large volumes of goods shipped between the EU, US and China.Brussels is also fearful that Chinese exports diverted from the US by Trump’s measures could shift to the European market and exacerbate the economic pain for domestic manufacturers suffering from the tariffs.“President von der Leyen called for a negotiated resolution to the current situation, emphasising the need to avoid further escalation,” the commission said in a statement following what it called her “constructive discussion” with Li on Tuesday.The two leaders discussed “setting up a mechanism for tracking possible trade diversion and ensuring any developments are duly addressed”, the commission said. “President von der Leyen emphasised China’s critical role in addressing possible trade diversion caused by tariffs, especially in sectors already affected by global overcapacity.”It added: “In response to the widespread disruption caused by the US tariffs, President von der Leyen stressed the responsibility of Europe and China, as two of the world’s largest markets, to support a strong reformed trading system — free, fair and founded on a level playing field.” China has been portraying itself as a bastion of stability in the global trading system, and experts in the country have called for Beijing to pursue agreements with countries other than the US.But China’s huge trade surplus with the rest of the world, which reached nearly $1tn last year, has led to tensions not only with the US but increasingly with the EU and large developing countries.Some content could not load. Check your internet connection or browser settings.The EU and other trading partners argue that Beijing is investing too much in manufacturing while not doing enough to stimulate domestic demand in China, which is suffering from a deep property slowdown.Beijing, meanwhile, has accused the EU of being protectionist for imposing tariffs on imports of Chinese electric vehicles. “Whether China-Europe relations can achieve greater development depends on both sides’ ability to meet halfway,” said the Global Times, a Chinese Communist party nationalist tabloid, in an editorial.It said China had delayed for three months additional tariffs on French cognac that it had imposed in retaliation for the EU levies on Chinese EVs. But it said Europe continued “focusing on addressing its own concerns while inadequately considering China’s reasonable requests”. More

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.Turkey has a chance to outperform other emerging markets hit by Donald Trump’s tariffs “once the dust settles” thanks to manageable US trade exposure and lower oil prices, the country’s finance minister said.Mehmet Şimşek told the Financial Times that the collapse in oil prices would narrow the current account deficit of energy-importing Turkey and thus help rebuild international reserves, a closely watched metric of the macroeconomic reforms he launched around 18 months ago.Slowing global growth and tight domestic money policies were also “disinflationary”, which would help get Turkish inflation down — a central aim of Şimşek’s stabilisation programme.On US tariffs, Şimşek argued Turkey’s $1.3tn economy was relatively insulated as 80 per cent of its trade is with countries with which it has a free trade agreement, such as its customs union with the EU, or with “friendly neighbours” in the Middle East, central Asia and north Africa.Trump, who has good relations with Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, placed the baseline 10 per cent tariff on Turkish exports to the US.“All of this is relatively constructive,” Şimşek said. “When the dust settles, we hope and believe Turkey could positively decouple” in investors’ eyes from more troubled emerging economies in Asia and elsewhere.Last year, bilateral trade with the US totalled $32bn, about 5 per cent of Turkey’s overall trade in goods, with a $1.5bn surplus in Turkey’s favour, according to US data.Şimşek’s economic programme faced its harshest test yet last month following the arrest of Istanbul mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu, the country’s star opposition politician and biggest rival to Erdoğan, sending Turkish financial markets plummeting.“There was a large but brief impact from domestic political-driven turbulence. Now [the turbulence] is tariff-driven,” Şimşek said in an interview.“In relative terms, our vulnerability is not so bad. We may have to live with softer growth. But what is, is: you have to live with external shocks such as these [US tariffs],” he said.İmamoğlu’s detention led to Turkey’s largest street protests in over a decade and forced the central bank to raise interest rates and spend billions to support the currency.İmamoğlu denies the corruption charges, with critics decrying his arrest as evidence of Erdoğan’s increasing authoritarianism. Government officials have said it shows that nobody is above the law.The lira has since stabilised and most analysts concur the country has got through the worst of that bout of market instability, although at the price of keeping interest rates high. Inflation fell to 38.1 per cent in March, compared to its peak of 75 per cent last May. Interest rates are currently 42.5 per cent.Although expected to hold rates this month, Turkey’s central bank is benefiting from “normalisation in domestic dollarisation and non-resident outflows following strong pressure on reserves in the first three days” following İmamoğlu’s arrest, Barclays analysts said in a note.Şimşek conceded that a slowing Turkish economy would mean lower tax revenues and this “could lead to wider budget deficit” than forecast. But, Şimşek stressed, the main point of a small fiscal deficit was to help the central bank get inflation down and not to stop Turkish debt rising, which is only around 25 per cent of GDP. The budget deficit had been forecast to fall to 3.1 per cent of GDP this year, from 4.9 per cent in 2024.“We will maintain spending discipline regardless,” he said. “Big picture, we can live with this.”Şimşek is viewed as a cornerstone of Turkey’s return to economic orthodoxy after the cheap credit policies previously favoured by Erdoğan brought runaway inflation and a balance of payments crisis.Many investors and analysts also believe that the recent market ructions have strengthened the position of Şimşek and other reformers in government, as their programme provides Erdoğan with an economic bedrock.“As long as Şimşek stays I think the market should provide an anchor against political instability,” Tim Ash, a long time Turkey watcher and sovereign strategist at RBC Bluebay Asset Management, wrote in a recent blog.Longer term, however, there are concerns that weak rule of law and continuing political instability could weigh on Turkey’s economy.Şimşek declined to talk about politics but said he was “all in favour of the rule of law, achieving price stability, enhancing predictability [and] improving the investment climate. Those are music to my ears.”Additional reporting by Joseph Cotterill in London More

This article is an on-site version of our FirstFT newsletter. Subscribers can sign up to our Asia, Europe/Africa or Americas edition to get the newsletter delivered every weekday morning. Explore all of our newsletters hereGood morning and welcome back to FirstFT Americas, your early morning business briefing. We are planning a reader Q&A to mark the first 100 days of Donald Trump’s second term in the White House and need your help. Email your questions to [email protected]. Now, on with today’s newsletter:US-China tensions risePeter Navarro defends Trump’s tariffsEric Schmidt buys £42mn London mansionAnd the dilemma facing the FedChina has vowed to “fight to the end” if the US introduces threatened tariff increases, escalating trade tensions between the world’s two biggest economies. Here’s what you need to know. What did China say? The commerce ministry today said it would further retaliate if Donald Trump carries through on his threat to impose an additional 50 per cent tariff on Chinese goods. Beijing’s warning follows a threat from the US president yesterday that he would introduce the additional tariff unless China dropped its threat to impose a 34 per cent levy on US imports. The proposed tariffs from Washington would take US duties on Chinese imports to more than 120 per cent, according to some estimates. Has China taken any other measures? Beijing backed up the threat of retaliation by fixing the exchange rate of its currency, the renminbi, at Rmb7.20 per dollar — the lowest since September 2023. The fixing rate is the centre point of the band in which the currency is allowed to trade and is set by the People’s Bank of China. A weaker renminbi makes Chinese goods cheaper abroad but risks capital outflows and undermining economic stability at home.What has been the reaction of other countries to Trump’s trade threats? National Economic Council director Kevin Hassett yesterday said the White House was in touch with 50 countries that were seeking trade deals with the US. Japan emerged as the first major economy to secure priority tariff negotiations with Trump. The US president said last night on his Truth Social platform that he had spoken to Japan’s Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba, triggering a 7 per cent surge in Tokyo-listed stocks earlier today. Treasury secretary Scott Bessent and US trade representative Jamieson Greer will lead the negotiations with Tokyo. Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and US commerce secretary Howard Lutnick discussed the Trump tariffs on Israel on Sunday, it was revealed yesterday.Billionaires lambast Trump: In an FT interview, Ken Langone, the co-founder of Home Depot, has become the latest wealthy backer of the Republican party to criticise Trump’s trade policy. For more analysis on the tariffs, sign up for our Trade Secrets newsletter if you’re a premium subscriber, or upgrade your subscription. Here’s what else we’re keeping tabs on today:Congress: US trade representative Jamieson Greer testifies before the Senate finance committee on Trump’s trade policy.Companies: Walgreens is expected to report second-quarter results after it agreed to be taken private by Sycamore in a $10bn deal. Walmart holds its annual investment community meeting in Dallas, and Boeing will release order and delivery numbers for March.US interest rates: Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco president Mary Daly speaks at an event at Brigham Young University Marriott School of Business, in Provo, Utah.Five more top stories1. Global stock markets regained some ground today after three sessions of steep declines and acute volatility. European stocks rose in morning trading and Asian markets ended in positive territory. Futures contracts suggest the S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite will both open higher. For the latest market moves go to our live blog. Treasuries drop: US government debt sold off sharply yesterday as hedge funds cut down on risk in their strategies.Unhedged: For investors who are rational and lucky enough to be sitting on cash or short-term bonds, the prospect of further declines will have them thinking of buying, not selling. When do you buy the dip?2. Wall Street traders are expected to report their best quarter in more than a decade after choppy markets during the Trump administration’s first months helped salvage an underwhelming performance by investment bankers. Market volatility in the first quarter has boosted traders but hampered corporate mergers and new stock market listings. Here’s more on what to expect when banks report earnings later this month.3. Trump has announced that the US would hold direct talks with Iran on curtailing Tehran’s nuclear programme, in a sign of possible progress in one of the Middle East’s most intractable problems. The US president said the “very high level” talks would take place on Saturday. Here’s more on what to expect from the talks.4. Eric Schmidt bought a double-fronted, stuccoed Holland Park mansion for almost £42mn last May, according to UK property records and people familiar with the matter. The former Google chief is the latest to join a surge of US buyers at the top end of the London property market. Read why Americans are investing in the capital’s prime residences.5. Mexico’s government is talking to the private sector about expanding fracking as Trump’s trade threats heighten fears over the country’s dependence on US gas. President Claudia Sheinbaum, a former climate scientist, directed officials to explore fracking to help deliver energy independence, executives with knowledge of the conversations have said.Today’s big read© FT montage; Dreamstime; Getty ImagesTrump’s decision to impose different tariff rates on countries around the world has created huge uncertainty for companies exporting goods to the US. To reduce the burden, companies will be seeking to reorder their supply chains to reduce the impact of so-called rules of origin regulations. Peter Foster explains how the rules work.We’re also reading . . . Peter Navarro: “A trade system where [the US] faces higher tariffs, steeper non-tariff barriers and no viable path to resolution is nothing more than an ‘honour system’,” argues Trump’s senior counsellor for trade and manufacturing.No way out: Even if Trump backs down, he will have succeeded in building uncertainty, which is itself a sort of tariff, writes Harvard University’s Jason Furman.Fox News: As rightwing critics slam Trump’s tariffs, the conservative news network has other priorities. Nintendo: The new Switch 2, due for release later this year, carries the hope of a company and a sector but has been thrust into a growing trade war.Chart of the daySome content could not load. Check your internet connection or browser settings.The US Federal Reserve faces a dilemma: cut interest rates to prevent an economic slowdown or keep them high to stave off inflation. “The Fed is in an exceptionally difficult position right now,” said one economist the FT spoke to for this article on the outlook for US interest rates. Take a break from the news . . . Children of Radium, the novelist and poet Joe Dunthorne’s family memoir, is an interrogation of his great-grandfather’s life story, taking in Nazi Germany, 1930s Turkey and the world of chemical weapons.The memorial at the site of the Sachsenhausen concentration camp in Oranienburg, north of Berlin More

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.Some content could not load. Check your internet connection or browser settings.MarketsThe stock market has dipped sharply in the early days of Donald Trump’s second term as president, the deepest sell-off since the early days of Barack Obama’s first term, at the height of the global financial crisis.Some content could not load. Check your internet connection or browser settings.The Vix index is a measure of investor expectations for volatility in the US stock market over the next 30 days. The index’s long-term average is slightly below 20. Levels above 25 point to expectations of heightened turbulence, implying daily swings of more than 1.5 per cent in the S&P 500. A rise in the Vix above 30 is typically associated with extreme volatility and has only happened a handful times in the past few years.Some content could not load. Check your internet connection or browser settings.The US dollar index is a measure of the value of the currency relative to a basket of other currencies. The index heads upwards when the dollar strengthens against these currencies and downwards when it weakens.Some content could not load. Check your internet connection or browser settings.EconomyThe US has outpaced its G7 peers in economic growth in both the short term and longer term.Some content could not load. Check your internet connection or browser settings.Annual change in US CPI peaked at 9 per cent in 2022, placing it in the middle of the G7 pack, but inflation remains stubbornly sticky.Some content could not load. Check your internet connection or browser settings.Industrial production has been sluggish and sentiment in the industry has vacillated in recent years.Some content could not load. Check your internet connection or browser settings.Federal employment features cyclical jumps due to the decennial census, but still represents a small share of overall employment.Some content could not load. Check your internet connection or browser settings.Additional development by Caroline Nevitt and Eade Hemingway More

Unlock the White House Watch newsletter for freeYour guide to what the 2024 US election means for Washington and the worldDonald Trump said he would sign an executive order extending the deadline for ByteDance, the Chinese owner of TikTok, to divest the popular video-sharing app’s US business and avoid a nationwide ban in America.The US president said on his Truth Social platform on Friday he would push back the deadline, which had been Saturday, by 75 days, adding the extension was designed to allow American companies trying to acquire TikTok more time to finalise a deal.“The Deal requires more work to ensure all necessary approvals are signed, which is why I am signing an Executive Order to keep TikTok up and running for an additional 75 days,” Trump wrote.Under a law passed by Congress last year, ByteDance had until January 19 to divest TikTok to non-Chinese entities, but that month Trump issued an order extending the deadline by 90 days. His latest order extends the deadline by another 75 days.The White House was this week close to establishing the parameters of a deal with US investors, although it would have needed more time to be fully executed, and approval from Beijing, according to people familiar with the matter.However, the process was derailed by Trump’s tariffs announcement, the people said. China would now seek to negotiate on tariffs before granting any approval, one of the people said. It is unclear if Beijing engaged in talks over the deal.A ByteDance spokesperson said in a statement: “ByteDance has been in discussion with the US government regarding a potential solution for TikTok US. An agreement has not been executed. There are key matters to be resolved. Any agreement will be subject to approval under Chinese law.”Trump said he hoped to “continue working in Good Faith with China”, which he added was unhappy with duties he imposed on imports of Chinese goods on Wednesday as part of his “reciprocal tariffs”. China on Friday retaliated with a 34 per cent tariff on imports from the US. It is also unclear if Beijing will allow a divestment or let a US group secure control of the app’s algorithm.“We do not want TikTok to ‘go dark’,” Trump added. “We look forward to working with TikTok and China to close the Deal.”Trump suggested earlier this week he could reduce tariffs on Chinese goods in exchange for Beijing allowing ByteDance to divest TikTok. The president has been forced to balance the security concerns that are core to the US TikTok legislation — which have long been raised by China hawks in Congress — and the huge support for the video-sharing app among younger users and his own success on the platform.TikTok did not immediately respond to a request for comment.Alison Szalwinski, vice-president at The Asia Group, a consultancy, said any extension to the deadline would likely concern companies that offer cloud and app store services to TikTok, such as Apple, Google and Oracle for legal reasons. Without a sale of TikTok, companies that distribute or host the app risk a fine of $5,000 per user, according to the legislation. “Companies are going to continue to be quite anxious,” Szalwinski said.The White House has been weighing a proposal to spin off TikTok from ByteDance that would create a new US company that would receive fresh American investment to dilute the ownership stakes of Chinese investors, people familiar with the matter told the Financial Times earlier this week.Under the terms of the proposal, a group of new investors including Andreessen Horowitz, Blackstone, Silver Lake and other big private capital groups would own about half of TikTok’s US business, the people said.These people added large existing investors in TikTok — including General Atlantic, Susquehanna, KKR and Coatue — would hold 30 per cent of the new US business.ByteDance would retain a stake at just below 20 per cent, which would satisfy a requirement in the TikTok legislation that no more than a fifth of the company be controlled by a “foreign adversary”.One crucial issue is who would control TikTok’s sought-after algorithm. One option under discussion involves ByteDance continuing to develop and operate the algorithm, which has been a central demand of China’s government, while the new US group could access it through a licensing agreement.But that could spark concern on Capitol Hill where many lawmakers insist China does not have control over the algorithm.The Republican lawmakers on the House China committee, which was instrumental in passing the TikTok legislation, on Friday said any deal must ensure that US law is followed, and that the Chinese Communist party “does not have access to American user data”. More

Unlock the White House Watch newsletter for freeYour guide to what the 2024 US election means for Washington and the worldRepublican senator Ted Cruz warned of a potential “bloodbath” for his party in the 2026 midterm elections if Donald Trump’s tariffs send the US economy into recession.The senator from Texas also predicted a “terrible” fate for the world’s largest economy should a full-blown trade war erupt and Trump’s tariffs, as well as any retaliatory measures on US goods, stay in place long-term.Typically a Trump ally, Cruz’s comments on his Verdict podcast on Friday were the starkest warning from a member of the president’s party since his “liberation day” levies kicked off the global market rout. Republican lawmakers have begun to worry about the effects of Trump’s tariffs on the economy and their party’s prospects for keeping control of both chambers of Congress in the 2026 midterm elections. Their concerns grew as Americans watched about $5.4tn of stock market capitalisation evaporate over a two-day Wall Street rout.On Thursday, Republican Chuck Grassley introduced a bill in the Senate, alongside a Democrat, to reassert Congressional control of tariff policy. Under the proposed law, new levies would expire in 60 days unless approved by Congress, and there would be a mechanism for lawmakers to cancel tariffs at any point.Support for the bill grew on Friday as Republican senators Lisa Murkowski, Mitch McConnell, Jerry Moran and Thom Tillis signed on as co-sponsors. The bill is likely more symbolic than anything, but points to increasing discord within the Republican party as lawmakers worry about the effects of the trade policy on constituencies reliant on exports — and on re-election hopes.There were already signs of voter discontent this week, when an Elon Musk-backed conservative lost a state supreme court seat in Wisconsin to the liberal candidate. Republicans also underperformed their 2024 results in two special House elections in Florida.If Trump’s and any retaliatory tariffs remain in place long-term and push the US into “a recession, particularly a bad recession, 2026 in all likelihood politically would be a bloodbath. You would face a Democrat House, and you might even face a Democrat Senate,” Cruz said.Despite the 53-47 Republican majority in the Senate, “if we’re in the middle of a recession and people are hurting badly, they punish the party in power”, Cruz said.The Canada-born Texan did not share the president’s assessment that the tariffs would usher in “a booming economy”. Instead, Cruz said there could be “an enormous economic boom” only if the US and any retaliating countries slash their duty rates.But if “every other country on earth” hits the US with retaliatory tariffs and Trump’s so-called reciprocal levies remain in place, “that is a terrible outcome”, the senator warned.If the confrontation between the US and its trading partners escalates into a full-blown trade war, “it would destroy jobs here at home, and do real damage to the US economy”, Cruz said. It would also “have a powerful upward impact on inflation”. More

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.A number of upcoming US initial public offerings, including $15bn fintech Klarna and $50bn medtech company Medline, have been postponed as Donald Trump’s aggressive tariffs roil global financial markets.“Buy now, pay later” company Klarna, private equity-backed surgical products company Medline and ticket company StubHub intended to go public but those plans have been put on hold because of market turbulence, said people familiar with the matter. All the companies had confidentially filed plans to list shares in recent months. Once a company publicly files their IPO paperwork with the Securities and Exchange Commission, they put themselves on a footing to launch an investor roadshow after 15 days. Klarna was planning to start the investor roadshow for its $15bn listing next week, while Medline, which is backed by Blackstone, Carlyle and Hellman & Friedman, planned to file publicly earlier this week, aiming at a near-$50bn valuation, but both listings have been delayed indefinitely.Ticketing company StubHub and virtual physical therapy company Hinge Health publicly filed their paperwork last month and were planning to start their investor roadshows early in April, but were now holding off before starting talks with potential investors, people said. The companies were under no obligation to float within a specific timeframe and the listing could still happen in the weeks ahead, the people added. Bloomberg late on Friday reported Israel-based trading platform eToro had also paused plans for a US public offering that it filed paperwork to pursue last month. The US IPO market had begun to show some signs of life in recent weeks following a three-year dry spell induced by higher interest rates, with data centre operator CoreWeave earlier this month tabling the biggest tech offering since Arm Holdings in 2023.But market volatility unleashed by Trump’s tariffs has knocked equity markets and forced many companies that were hoping to go public to hold off. That marks a stark turnaround from the start of the year, when many bankers had said they expected the IPO market to boom under an ostensibly pro-business Republican administration.Global markets have plunged since Trump announced sweeping tariffs on US trade partners this week. The losses were extended on Friday as China announced retaliatory measures and investors took fright at the prospect of a full-blown global trade war.The S&P 500 ended Friday’s session down 6 per cent, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite lost 5.8 per cent.Klarna declined to comment. Medline, Hinge Health and StubHub did not immediately respond to request comments. More