Alcoa and Rio Tinto, two of the biggest aluminium players with significant operations in North America, are publicly challenging the very policy that once appeared to shield them. According to fresh revelations this week, Alcoa claims Trump’s aluminium tariffs have cost it USD 115 million in elevated raw material expenses during the ongoing year’s second quarter, while Rio Tinto has warned of “distortions” in the US market that are “undermining competitiveness rather than enhancing it.”
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When former US President Donald Trump launched the Section 232 tariffs in 2018, cloaked in the language of national security, American aluminium producers cheered. The logic seemed straightforward. As the nation slapped a 10 per cent import tariff on aluminium, it would revive domestic smelting capacity by protecting it from cheaper foreign imports.
But seven years on, that promise is showing rust.
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