Apple and its customers can breathe a sigh of relief today after the White House carved tariff exemptions for smartphones, laptops, and more. The iPhone maker was facing a 145% fee on products imported into the United States from China. This caused weeks of speculation that the iPhone and other electronics could be subject to price hikes to cover the cost.
Bloomberg reported on the tariff exemption policy development:
The exclusions, published late Friday by US Customs and Border Protection, narrow the scope of the levies by excluding the products from Trump’s 125% China tariff and his baseline 10% global tariff on nearly all other countries.
The exclusions would apply to smartphones, laptop computers, hard drives and computer processors and memory chips. Those popular consumer electronics items generally aren’t made in the US. Setting up domestic manufacturing would take years.
The products that won’t be subject to Trump’s new tariffs also include machines used to make semiconductors. That would be important for Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., which has announced a major new investment in the US as well as other chipmakers.
The move follows a week of policy and market volatility in which the White House issued tariff increases across the board for imports, reset tariff rates for 90 days for most countries except for China, and stated that the iPhone could be built in the USA.
But as Bloomberg’s coverage suggests, the tech industry may not be out of the woods yet. That’s because the Trump administration may be planning sector-specific tariff rates separate from the 145% tariff rate put on imports from China. For now, the return to a 10% tariff rate on electronics will likely offer relief to Apple and consumers who were rushing to buy products at pre-tariff prices over the last few days.
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