Gold and macro environment, page-1230

A very good read on **promotion blocked**

https://www.**promotion blocked**.com/news/article/2025-05-14/whether-145-or-10-tariff-uncertainty-enough-stop-us-gold-and-silver-imports

A few highlights....
Gold prices have pulled back since the United States and China announced the lowering of trade tariffs for 90 days amid ongoing negotiations. But whether tariffs today are 145%, 30%, or 10%, the uncertainty gripping U.S. trade continues to make meaningful importing activities impossible. And despite early indications that precious metals would be exempt from Trump’s tariffs, trade activity in the sector is far from normal.

Josh Phair is the CEO of Scottsdale Mint. He said that while the headline may be ‘Gold and Silver Imports are Tariff-Free’, the reality is not nearly so simple.

“They said that bullion is exempted,” Phair told **promotion blocked** News. “But if we start looking at a lot of the tariff codes, everyone's going to need to know exactly what is considered bullion, because in our industry we call coins bullion, like from Perth Mint, for example, but that actually is legal tender. It's a monetary bullion product.” Phair, who works with both large and small companies, said the uncertainty is causing importers to sit on their hands. “Unfortunately, when you're sitting on your hands, there's no business happening,” he said. In our industry, if you look around, there's a lot of things missing. Certain British product got held up and hasn't been imported, certain things that we would normally have in our market on the coin side for retail.”

Jeff Christian is Managing Partner of CPM Group. He also believes that the fundamental problem isn’t how high or low the tariffs are, but how the numbers are being calculated, and how they keep changing.

“When it comes to tariffs and what tariffs mean for precious metals, the first thing you have to say is [Trump] is being totally arbitrary and capricious,” Christian told **promotion blocked** News. “He's changing his view two, three times a day. He's throwing things in, and he is taking things out. So you really can't say definitively what the tariffs will apply to, or if there even will be tariffs.” He said the tariffs on specific metals or products remain unclear. “Are tariffs being applied to gold, silver, platinum, palladium? It changes from day to day, hour to hour, but it looks as if they will be exempt,” he said. “Who knows?

“The tariffs are very destructive of economic activity,” he said. “If it's a 20% or a 25% duty, it's a tax. You're taking that away from the producer, and you're taking it away from the consumer. So there's less consumption and there's less profit for producers, importers, and exporters.”

“That's probably the more destructive and important thing to pay attention to, is what the tariffs will do to business, and to businesses that use gold and silver.”

Christian said the effects of the tariffs will be as complex as the industries and markets they’re hitting. “It's a two-edged sword,” he said. “It will hurt demand for gold and silver and platinum and palladium in manufactured products, but it will help investment demand for gold and silver, because investors are watching, and they know what tariffs do to economic activity.”

“We have people who see greater risks and uncertainties today, greater anxiety over the economic and political outcome in the United States and in the world, than at any time going back to December of 1941,” he said. “People are extremely concerned.” Christian said this uncertainty manifests in different ways – not only increased investor demand for gold and silver, but increased concern over what kind of bullion products they’re holding, where, and with whom.