Panic selling gripped global markets on Monday, as US President Donald Trump refused to budge on his swingeing tariffs despite China retaliating and global recession warnings growing louder.Countries across the world have been scrambling to blunt the edge of the new US tariffs, but Beijing signalled it was taking the levies head on, escalating the trade war between the world’s two biggest economies.Trump doubled down on his demand to slash deficits with the US’ trading partners, saying he would not cut any deals unless that was resolved.”Sometimes you have to take medicine to fix something,” Trump said on Sunday.He told reporters aboard Air Force One that world leaders are “dying to make a deal.”Trump announced last week a baseline 10-percent import tariff on goods coming into the United States and higher rates for many countries including allies the European Union, Japan and Taiwan.Most countries have stopped short of retaliating but China announced on Friday — after Asian markets closed — retaliatory tariffs of 34 percent on all US goods from April 10. “(This) is blunt-force economic warfare,” said Stephen Innes at SPI Asset Management.”The market’s telling you in plain language: global demand is vanishing, and a global recession is on the cards and coming on fast,” Innes said.Trillions of dollars have been wiped off stocks worldwide, and on Monday Asian equities took an even heavier hammering as investors moved to safer assets.In Japan the Nikkei was off an eye-watering 6.5 percent, falling almost eight percent in early trade. In Hong Kong the Hang Seng plunged almost 10 percent and the Shanghai Composite more than four percent. Taiwan’s main index — like in Hong Kong and Shanghai closed on Friday — plummeted almost 10 percent and Singapore 8.5 percent.Futures contracts for the New York Stock Exchange’s main boards were sharply down Sunday, suggesting more pain for battered Wall Street stocks when markets open Monday.US oil dropped below $60 a barrel for the first time since April 2021 on worries of a global recession.- ‘Deals and alliances’ -Benjamin Netanyahu, prime minister of Israel — which has been hit with 17 percent tariffs, despite being one of Washington’s closest allies — was due Monday to become the first leader to meet Trump since last week’s announcement.Britain’s Prime Minister Keir Starmer warned in a newspaper op-ed that “the world as we knew it has gone,” saying the status quo would increasingly hinge on “deals and alliances.”Trump’s staggered deadlines have left space for some countries to negotiate, even as he insisted he would stand firm and his administration warned against any retaliation.”More than 50 countries have reached out to the president to begin a negotiation,” Kevin Hassett, head of the White House National Economic Council, told ABC’s This Week on Sunday, citing the US Trade Representative.Vietnam, a manufacturing powerhouse that counted the US as its biggest export market in the first quarter, has already reached out and requested a delay of at least 45 days to thumping 46 percent tariffs imposed by Trump.- ‘Bad actors’ -Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent also told NBC’s Meet the Press that 50 countries had reached out.But as for whether Trump will negotiate with them, “I think that’s a decision for President Trump,” Bessent said. “At this moment he’s created maximum leverage for himself… I think we’re going to have to see what the countries offer, and whether it’s believable,” Bessent said. Other countries have been “bad actors for a long time, and it’s not the kind of thing you can negotiate away in days or weeks,” he claimed.Peter Navarro, Trump’s tariff guru, has pushed back against the mounting nervousness and insisted to investors that “you can’t lose money unless you sell,” promising “the biggest boom in the stock market we’ve ever seen.”Russia has not been targeted by the latest raft of tariffs, and Hassett cited talks with Moscow over its invasion of Ukraine as the reason for their omission from the hit list.On Wednesday a White House official suggested the reason for Russia’s omission was because trade was negligible thanks to sanctions.Trump has long insisted that countries around the world that sell products to the United States are in fact ripping Americans off, and he sees tariffs as a means to right that wrong.”Some day people will realize that Tariffs, for the United States of America, are a very beautiful thing!” Trump wrote on Truth social Sunday.But many economists have warned that tariffs are passed on to US consumers and that they could see price rises at home.”I don’t think that you’re going to see a big effect on the consumer in the US,” Hassett said.

Asian markets collapsed Monday after China hammered the United States with its own hefty tariffs, ramping up a trade war that many fear could spark a recession.Trading floors were overcome by a wave of selling as investors fled to the hills on the worst day for equities since the pandemic, with Hong Kong shedding more than 10 percent, Tokyo diving eight percent and Taipei more than nine percent.Futures for Wall Street’s markets were also taking another hammering, while concerns about the impact on demand also saw commodities slump.Donald Trump sparked a market meltdown last week when he unveiled sweeping tariffs against US trading partners for what he says was years of being ripped off and claiming that governments were lining up to cut deals with Washington.But after Asian markets closed on Friday, China said it would impose retaliatory levies of 34 percent on all US goods from April 10. It also imposed export controls on seven rare earth elements, including gadolinium — commonly used in MRIs — and yttrium, utilised in consumer electronics.Hopes that the US president would rethink his policy in light of the turmoil were dashed Sunday when he said he would not make a deal with other countries unless trade deficits were solved.He denied that he was intentionally engineering a selloff and insisted he could not foresee market reactions.”Sometimes you have to take medicine to fix something,” he said of the ructions that have wiped trillions of dollars off company valuations.– No sector spared –The selling in Asia was across the board, with no sector unharmed by the savage selling — tech firms, car makers, banks, casinos and energy firms all felt the pain as investors abandoned riskier assets.Among the biggest losers, Chinese ecommerce titans Alibaba and JD.com tanked more than 11 percent, while Japanese tech investment giant SoftBank dived more than 10 percent.Shanghai shed more than five percent and Singapore more than six percent, while Seoul gave up more than five percent triggering a so-called sidecar mechanism — for the first time in eight months — that briefly halted some trading. Concerns about demand saw oil prices sink more than three percent Monday, having dropped around seven percent Friday. Both main contracts are now sitting at their lowest levels since 2021. Copper — a vital component for energy storage, electric vehicles, solar panels and wind turbines — also extended losses.”The market is in free-fall mode again, punching through floors,” said Stephen Innes at SPI Asset Management. “Trump’s team isn’t blinking. The tariffs are being treated as a victory lap, not a bargaining chip.”The losses followed another day of carnage on Wall Street on Friday, where all three main indexes fell almost six percent.That came after Federal Reserve boss Jerome Powell said US tariffs will likely cause inflation to rise and growth to slow and warned of an “elevated” risk of higher unemployment.The measures by Trump are likely to give US central bankers a headache as they try to balance the need for interest rate cuts to support the economy with the need to keep a lid on prices.His comments came after Trump had insisted “my policies will never change” and urged the Fed to cut rates.”Powell’s hands are tied,” said Innes. “He’s acknowledged the obvious — that tariffs are inflationary and recessionary — but he’s not signalling a rescue. “And that’s the problem. This time, the Fed’s inflation mandate is forcing it to keep the safety net rolled up while asset prices get torched.”Tim Waterer, chief market analyst at KCM Trade, said: “Traders are nervously watching the two biggest economies going toe to toe on tariffs and are fearing that both could receive knockout blows from a prolonged economic fight.”Neither the US nor China are backing down when it comes to slapping new tariffs on each other and in this escalatory environment it’s not surprising to see that risk assets are being avoided like the plague.”- Key figures around 0230 GMT -Tokyo – Nikkei 225: DOWN 6.5 percent at 31,591.84Hong Kong – Hang Seng Index: DOWN 9.3 percent at 20,725.20Shanghai – Composite: DOWN 6.1 percent at 3,138.32West Texas Intermediate: DOWN 2.2 percent at $60.66 per barrelBrent North Sea Crude: DOWN 2.2 percent at $64.14 per barrelDollar/yen: DOWN at 146.04 yen from 146.98 yen on FridayEuro/dollar: UP at $1.0964 from $1.0962Pound/dollar: UP at $1.2908 from $1.2893Euro/pound: DOWN at 84.94 pence from 85.01 penceNew York – Dow: DOWN 5.5 percent at 38,314.86 (close) London – FTSE 100: DOWN 5.0 percent at 8,054.98 (close)