Ofcourse demand will suffer if a global trade war affects economic sentiment. Plenty history to support that. An economic downturn will supress tin prices. And in a trade war the impact of detoriaton will be more so in goods than in services.
The other side of this is also that it will de-incentivize investing in new mines/production, and perhaps if MLX finally will make good use of it huge cash stash it will allow them to buy back a good chunck of their shares. However the latter part needs to be proven, the prior share buy back was hopefull, but it really lacked real bite. I am sure that with hindsight everyone agrees they should have been more opportunistic.
The bottom line is that the tin price does what it does, for me it remains more important what management actions are around shareholder returns. An inevitable low tin price will be bad for earnings, but also provides opportunities if played right. Mixed bag.
Also don't underestimate the impact of lower fuel prices on profatibility of alluvial deposits. In any commodity the impact of demand is underexposed, and the impact of supply overexposed.
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