ADVERTISEMENTUS President Donald Trump claims he has “solved inflation”, despite the recent market turmoil triggered by his enactment of global tariffs.
Speaking in the Oval Office during his meeting with El Salvador’s president Nayib Bukele, on Monday, Trump seized on the latest monthly consumer price report, which shows a 2.4% inflation rate for March.
“We have to solve problems, and we already solved inflation. You know, if you look at the numbers, the numbers are incredible, actually. The stock market’s up. And we’re not letting other countries take advantage of this country like they have for the last 40 years,” Trump told reporters.
The US President also pointed to tech giant Nvidia’s announcement that it will produce artificial intelligence super computers in the United States for the first time as evidence of the success of his tariffs.
“Well, it’s one of the biggest announcements you’ll ever hear, because Nvidia, as you know, controls almost the entire sector, which is one of most important sectors in the world, between chips and semiconductors and everything else. And they’re the biggest,” Trump said.
“And the reason they did it is because of the election on November 5th and because of a thing called tariffs, as I said, the most beautiful word in the dictionary,” he added.
President Trump spoke following a turbulent week in the markets, during which his administration rolled back some of its most aggressive tariffs.
Global stock markets saw gains on Monday after Trump temporarily eased certain tariffs, and tensions within the US bond market also appeared to lessen.
Wall Street was buoyed by strong performances from Apple and other tech companies, following Trump’s announcement that smartphones, computers, and several other electronic products would be exempt from the latest round of tariffs. The move helped prevent potential price hikes for American consumers on goods imported from China.
This exemption is expected to benefit US importers, who would otherwise face the difficult choice of either passing on the increased costs to customers or absorbing the financial hit themselves.
The US President has also said he plans to provide temporary exemptions to carmakers on his tariffs.
“We’re looking at something to help some of the car companies with it,” Trump told reporters gathered in the Oval Office.
He explained that the automotive industry needed more time to shift their production from countries like Canada and Mexico back to the United States.
“And they need a little bit of time because they’re going to make them here, but they need a little bit of time. So I’m talking about things like that,” he said.
Global stock markets also rebounded as tensions in Trump’s trade war with China – the world’s second-largest economy – began to ease. Market indexes rose by 2.4% in France, 2.9% in Germany, 1.2% in Japan, and 1% in South Korea.
