The Trump administration on Friday announced additional duties of 25% on French cosmetics, handbags and other imports valued at $1.3bn in response to France’s digital services tax, Reuters reports. Washington would, however, hold off on implementing the move for up to 180 days.

The US Trade Representative’s office added items valued at $3.1bn to its list of European goods eligible to be hit with duties - including black olives, beer and gin - and said it could switch gears to target other items on a previously published list or raise existing duty levels further. The move is part of the latest development in the 16-year dispute over aircraft subsidies between Europe’s Airbus and US rival Boeing.

The United Kingdom announced a new post-Brexit tariff regime on Tuesday to replace the European Union’s external tariff, maintaining a 10% tariff on cars but cutting levies on tens of billions of dollars of supply chain imports.

For China the coronavirus outbreak is already having a damaging economic and business impact, affecting everything from tourism to the supply of parts to the automotive and technology industries. Stock markets have been volatile and China’s economy – which makes up one-sixth of the global economy – hammered. 

The EU will seek a reset of EU-US trade relations on a number of contentious issues, Trade Commissioner Phil Hogan, was quoted as saying. He will meet his US counterpart, Robert Lighthizer, for the first time next month after talking to him just before Christmas. The Trump administration imposed tariffs on European steel and aluminum in mid-2018. It has done the same to $7.5bn worth of EU products over a dispute about subsidies for Airbus, and is threatening action against France over a digital services tax.

France warned the United States of strong EU retaliation if it imposed tariffs on key French products ranging from sparkling wine to cheese to handbags, in an intensifying row over taxing digital giants that risks spiralling into a new trade war, coming just hours before Trump is due to meet his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron on the sidelines of the NATO summit in London.

The EU-Singapore trade agreement will enter into force on 21 November after being endorsed last week by the Member States, the EU press service reported. Under the deal, Singapore will remove all remaining tariffs on EU products. The agreement also gives new opportunities for EU services' providers, among others in sectors such as telecommunications, environmental services, engineering, computing and maritime transport.

The World Trade Organisation (WTO) formally ruled on Monday that the United States is free to take countermeasures against the European Union and Airbus-producing countries Britain, France, Germany, and Spain. This way the President Donald Trump administration no longer faces any legal obstacles for its set of previously scheduled sanctions on billions of dollars of European products that could now take effect on Friday.

An escalating battle over aircraft subsidies between the US and the European Union threatens to damage both sides, said Airbus SE Chief Executive Officer Guillaume Faury. He will thus continue to advocate for a settlement between the two sides before the imposition of tariffs becomes a "lose-lose game" for both of them.

US President Donald Trump announced on Wednesday that Washington and Tokyo had taken a major step towards sealing a comprehensive new trade deal, after a year of negotiations between the global economic powers. Sitting next to Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Trump said the leaders "formally announce the first stage of a phenomenal new trade agreement. The pact is a rare trade success for the president who has struggled to secure pacts with other trade partners, including China.