President Donald Trump on Monday introduced he would scale back tariffs on Indian items in alternate for, amongst different issues, a promise to stop buying Russian oil.
That will probably be a tall activity: India has been importing roughly 1.5 million barrels of Russian oil every day – even months after Trump positioned tariffs on Indian items as punishment – in accordance to Kpler, a world commerce knowledge supplier.
Trump mentioned in a social media submit that he spoke Monday morning with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who agreed to change the nation’s Russian crude imports with oil from Venezuela and the United States. Venezuelan oil is of the identical high quality as Russian oil – heavy, bitter and ideal for making derivatives like gasoline oil and diesel.
It’s not clear, nonetheless, how lengthy that transition might take. Venezuela’s oil infrastructure is dilapidated and requires a few decade of labor and tens of billions of funding {dollars} to return it to the more-than-3 million barrels a day output it had achieved earlier than the nation’s Socialist authorities took management in 1999.
That could also be why Trump’s tariff discount on India was much less pronounced than the discount achieved by some commerce frameworks with different nations. Trump mentioned Indian items would instantly face an 18% tariff, down from 25%. It’s not instantly clear whether or not or not the extra 25% tariff for buying Russian oil would stay in place.
India and China are among the many major patrons of Russian oil, which has been sanctioned by most Western nations due to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s warfare with Ukraine.
Trump, calling Modi “one of my greatest friends,” additionally mentioned India’s prime minister agreed to scale back India’s tariffs on US items to zero,and to take away unspecified non-tariff obstacles. Although Trump didn’t clarify which obstacles could be eliminated, these typically embrace particular taxes on US corporations’ providers or value-added taxes on items.
India additionally pledged to spend money on American items “at a much higher level” as well as to a $500 billion invesment in US power, know-how, agriculture and coal amongst different merchandise, Trump mentioned.
Although India isn’t certainly one of America’s largest buying and selling companions, the discount in tariffs may nonetheless make a significant dent: The United States imported $95.5 billion in items from India in 2025, and it exported $42 billion of products to India final 12 months, in accordance to the US Census Bureau.
This is a creating story and will probably be up to date.