In the most serious threat to the Iranian ceasefire to date, Iran fired several ballistic missiles at the main U.S. naval base in Bahrain, as well as Kuwait’s Ali Al-Salem airbase and Kuwait’s civilian airport (where significant damage delayed flights and killed one person). After earlier “disabling” an oil tanker heading to Iran, the U.S. struck a communications tower on the Iranian island of Qeshm. U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio raised eyebrows in stating negotiations on Iran’s nuclear program would be “highly technical” and could take months.
The U.S. Trade Representative Office proposed on Tuesday a new tariff structure on 60 countries (from which 99.4% of U.S. imports are shipped) based on findings from a Section 301 (Trade Act of ‘74) review of foreign government acts, policies or practices which are “unreasonable or discriminatory” and burden or restrict U.S. commerce. USTR findings focus on failure of cited countries to “impose a legal prohibition on the importation of goods produced wholly or in part with forced labor.”
A separate raft of 301 investigations is currently being conducted to review U.S. trading partners’ “excess manufacturing capacity,” and these reviews could result in additional tariffs “stackable” on top of proposed forced-labor levies.
Following a Bloomberg Economics report that the Reserve Bank of India “likely” sold $12B of its gold reserves in the two weeks ended May 22 (while buying $7.5B of foreign-currency assets), the RBI issued a statement on Wednesday firmly denying the report and stating its physical gold stock remains unchanged at 880.52t. Separately, an Indian government order issued on Tuesday added “grain and powder forms” of 99.9%-purity silver products to the list of restricted silver imports and mandated prior authorization licenses from India’s Directorate General of Foreign Trade.
Did you know Wealthion offers a variety of services from free portfolio reviews to potential access to private placement investing in the real assets space? Become a Wealthion member and you'll also get exclusive videos, articles and market commentary on the sector for free! Join our Wealthion Community now by clicking below.