Asia Summary and Highlights 27 January
Trump has announced tariffs and sanctions against Colombia, 25% now, 50% in a week
Colombian president orders increase of import tariffs on US goods as retaliation
Then White House says Colombia has agreed to accept illegal migrants returned from the US and is withholding all tariff
Asia Session
The tariff man strikes and have drawn first blood on Colombia. Over the weekend, Trump has announced tariffs and sanctions against Colombia. Tariffs on Colombian starts at 25%, to be increased to 50% in a week, citing Columbia's refusal to accept military deportation flight. Colombian president orders increase of import tariffs on US goods as retaliation. However, the White House soon says Colombia has agreed to accept illegal migrants returned from the US and is withholding all tariff. But risk continues to slump and sees USD/JPY trading 0.06% higher at 156.04 after gap lower at 155.67 from 155.94 Friday close.
Market participants reignited their fear against more tariff from Trump as he slapped it against Colombia. U.S. major equity indexes are slammed lower and continue to dive deeper as more Asian market online. Another story brewing about a Chinese AI startup, Deepseek, which trained their language model with more basic GPU, is able to compete with large language models introduced in the U.S.. It seems to be further weighing on U.S. equities, especially Nvidia. AUD/USD is down 0.43% to 0.6286 despite regional sentiment positive as USD strengthens, NZD/USD is also down 0.44% to 0.5684 while USD/CAD rose 0.32% with oil down more than half a dollar. Else, EUR/USD and GBP/USD are down 0.32%