US to impose tariffs of up to 3,521% on south-east Asia solar panels
US trade officials are preparing to impose tariffs of up to 3,521% on imports of solar panels from four south-east Asian countries, while the International Energy Agency has said lessons from the energy crisis following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine had not been fully learned.The US commerce department has announced the new tariffs, targeting companies in Cambodia, Thailand, Malaysia and Vietnam, after an investigation begun a year ago when American manufacturers of solar panels accused Chinese companies of flooding the market with subsidised, cheap goods.Products from Cambodia would face the highest tariffs, of 3,521%, because its companies did not cooperate with the US investigation, while products made in Malaysia by the Chinese manufacturer Jinko Solar face duties of just over 41%; rival Trina Solar’s products from Thailand will incur tariffs of 375%.A separate US government agency, the International Trade Commission, is due to make a final decision on the tariffs in June.The case was brought last year by the Korean company Hanwha Qcells, Arizona-based First Solar and several smaller solar panel makers in the US.
They accused Chinese companies with factories in Malaysia, Cambodia, Thailand and Vietnam of shipping panels priced below their cost of production, owing to unfair state subsidies,However, critics, including the Solar Energy Industries Association trade group, have said tariffs would harm US solar producers because they would raise prices on the imported cells that are assembled into panels at American factories,Separately, the head of the International Energy Agency, Fatih Birol, outlined concerns about the future of energy security ahead of a 60-country summit in London on Thursday and Friday that he is hosting with the UK energy secretary, Ed Miliband,It will be attended by ministers from the US, Japan, France, Germany and India, and oil-producing states including Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, along with the bosses of big oil and gas companies and renewable energy companies,Russia is excluded, and China will be absent because of a diary clash, in a blow to the summit.
Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 sparked international sanctions, the loss of Russian gas from Europe, a spike in wholesale energy costs and a rush to secure alternative energy supplies.Birol told the Financial Times he thought the “lessons from Ukraine have not yet been fully understood”, adding that there were three golden rules for energy security: diversification of supplies, sufficient political predictability to allow companies to make long-term investments, and global cooperation.Europe remains heavily reliant on imported gas and markets have been volatile, amid changes to energy subsidies and regulations, and the trade war unleashed by Donald Trump’s frequent tariff announcements.Sign up to Business TodayGet set for the working day – we'll point you to all the business news and analysis you need every morningafter newsletter promotionBirol said the trade war had caused “uncertainty which will affect demand for oil and gas for some time to come”.There are growing risks surrounding energy supplies, including the wars in Ukraine and Gaza, the climate crisis, attacks on undersea cables and cyber-attacks.
“There are traditional risks and emerging risks and these have to be more in the international debate,” he said,The oil and gas producers Shell, BP, ExxonMobil, TotalEnergies, Eni and Equinor are due to attend, alongside the wind energy companies Ørsted and Vestas, and utilities EDF, Enel, Octopus and Iberdrola,“We invited China, but unfortunately they were not able to accept due to calendar reasons,” said Birol,“We wish everybody was at the table, but the countries attending the meeting make up three-quarters of the world’s GDP, which in my view is not bad at all,”The London summit will be preceded by a meeting on Wednesday between UK ministers and industry experts with technical workshops to discuss gas security, critical minerals and Ukraine’s energy system.
‘Honest folk are paying for this’: the fight against Britain’s billion-pound energy heist
From raids on marijuana farms to illegal bitcoin miners, suppliers are finding new ways to tackle the rise in gas and electricity theftBy the time a team of police officers and engineers stormed a disused office block in Wigan, Greater Manchester, on a November morning last year, the building had been abandoned.Left behind were rooms filled with thousands of cannabis plants: a nursery on the first floor, the growing crop on the second, and leaves drying out on the third. The criminal gang behind the marijuana farm is thought to have fled after the grid operator cut off the stolen electricity used to power scores of LED lamps.“This was a proper setup,” said one engineer at the network operator Electricity North West, who took part in the raid. “It had a kitchen, television, several beds and even a treadmill
Travel body accuses government of ‘sabotaging’ UK tourism industry
The government has been accused of “sabotaging” the UK’s tourism industry, after figures showed international visitors spent more than £2bn less last year than they did before the pandemic.The World Travel and Tourism Council (WTTC) – which found in a new study that people visiting the UK spent £40.3bn in 2024, down 5.3% on 2019 – said that the government has made “deliberate policy choices” that had created “barriers to travel”.The policies singled out include the lack of tax-free shopping, increasing air passenger duty and introducing electronic travel authorisations
US stock markets fall again as Trump calls Fed chair ‘a major loser’
US stock markets fell again on Monday as Donald Trump continued attacks against the Federal Reserve chair, Jerome Powell, who the US president called “a major loser” for not lowering interest rates.“There can be a slowing of the economy unless Mr. Too Late, a major loser, lowers interest rates, NOW,” Trump wrote on social media.In recent days, Trump has amped up attacks against the Fed chair, pushing Powell to lower interest rates to offset the inflationary impacts of the new tariffs.Trump is pressuring the Fed to cut rates, likely to appease the stock market, which plummeted after he announced his newest slate of tariffs
Boeing investors brace for fallout from Trump tariffs
Investors in Boeing are braced to learn the full impact of Donald Trump’s trade war, amid fears the US planemaker could be hit harder than first expected after jets intended for a Chinese airline were returned to the US.A Boeing 737 Max 8 plane intended for use by a Chinese airline returned to the US on Monday from Boeing’s China finishing centre, according to flight data cited by Reuters. It followed the arrival in the US on Sunday of another 737 Max painted in the livery of China’s Xiamen Airlines at Boeing’s US production hub in Seattle.Boeing’s share price fell by nearly 3% on Monday, in line with a sell-off across Wall Street. US stock markets have been hit with much higher volatility this month as investors have tried to work out the effects of Trump’s tariffs
Trump’s erratic tariffs harder to navigate than pandemic, says UK export agency
The government agency responsible for supporting UK exporters has warned that uncertainty created by Donald Trump’s rapidly shifting tariff policies is making it difficult to predict the financial fallout for British businesses.Tim Reid, the chief executive of UK Export Finance (UKEF), said the US president’s escalating trade war posed a unprecedented challenge.UKEF is no stranger to a crisis. It was established in 1919 to help firms hit by the submarine blockade after the first world war. A century later, it mobilised to get government-backed loans and financial support to companies whose revenues were upended by supply chain disruptions during the Covid pandemic
NatWest investors to scrutinise pay in last AGM before full privatisation
This week, NatWest will hold its last annual shareholder meeting before returning to full private ownership, with the government expected to sell its remaining stake in the bailed-out bank in the coming weeks.The bank, formerly known as Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS), will host shareholders on Wednesday at its sprawling Gogarburn campus in Edinburgh, the £350m complex that became a symbol of the excesses that led to RBS’s £46bn bailout in 2008.Once known for cavernous offices featuring deep-pile carpets and expensive artwork under the disgraced former boss Fred Goodwin, Gogarburn is now a hub for executives proudly declaring a restrained approach to banking. Speaking to shareholders during a virtual event earlier this month, the chief executive, Paul Thwaite, said he was “not seeking to dramatically change the shape of our business or the amount of risk we are willing to take”.While the chancellor, Rachel Reeves, is pushing for more risk-taking across the City that could help kickstart growth, ministers will find some comfort in the fact that NatWest will be left in a much stronger position than it was 17 years ago
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