04/10/25 Afternoon CommStock Report – “A Little Bit Yippy”

I was lucky enough to have lost my phone recently so I had to get a new one. I got a good jump on the tariffs. We will see if the new phone can last through the length of the trade war. Let me know what that is. I had recently ordered and received a number of household items, odd stuff like stairs for the dog to climb up to the bed. When each box came, they were almost all “Made in China.” We will be a lot more attentive to where this stuff comes from if it continues to be available. I doubt the dog would be so lucky if the stairs were 145% more expensive after the President’s latest tariff hike.  Anything priced near a 145% markup will see demand destruction. 145%, applied to what have been $450 bln in Chinese exports to the US, sounds like it would generate a lot of revenue. That is an illusion, however, because when the tariff rate rises to near triple digits, trade collapses as does tariff revenue. Unless they too increase them, China is only charging us an 84% tariff on what we sell to them so I suppose the…