China has once again raised its tariff on US goods to match Trump’s, for what it says is the final time. China’s tariff is now set at 125 percent, as it warns that the US is on track to become an economic “joke.”
In a statement from China’s Ministry of Finance, which we’ve translated using Google, the country says that any further tariffs from the US side would “no longer make economic sense,” and that the US “will become a joke in the history of the world economy.” Trump initially set a tariff of 10 percent for China in February, which has risen four times, now set at 145 percent. Until now, China has retaliated in kind with its own matching tariff hikes.
China says that at the new tariff rate of 125 percent there is no longer any “market acceptance for US goods exported to China,” so there’s no sense in raising tariffs further. “If the US continues to play the tariff numbers game, China will ignore it,” the statement says.
China isn’t ruling out other forms of retaliation, however, ending the statement with a warning: “If the US insists on continuing to substantially infringe on China’s interests, China will resolutely counterattack and fight to the end.” Yesterday the country announced it was reducing the number of Hollywood films it would permit to release, and over the last week it has also restricted import and export rights for a number of US companies.
After offering voluntary exits in January, Google is said to have laid off “hundreds of employees” in the division responsible for Android, Chrome, Pixel, and more.
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President Donald Trump’s tariffs are already warping the outlook for ad spending, casting a long, uncertain shadow over the year ahead. The full impact remains to be seen — especially since he delayed most tariffs for another 90 days — but early projections point to a market that’s already bracing for impact.
Magna’s latest forecast paints the picture: the digital heavyweights — Google, Meta, Amazon and others — collectively brought in $271 billion in U.S. ad revenue last year. These so-called “digital pure players”, spanning search retail media, social, video and audio are now projected to grow by 9.1% in 2025. That’s a subtle but telling dip from the previously expected 9.9%.
Social media, often the bellwether for digital ad health, is especially losing pace. The sector brought in $83 billion last year and is not forecast to grow by 10.7% down from 11.5% — an early sign of advertisers finishing in an uncertain climate.
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Despite the carrot and stick tactics deployed by Elon Musk’s X to cajole advertisers back on to its platform, big brands still aren’t buying in.
In the math used by marketers and media buyers to decide whether a social platform is worth their investment, X remains on the wrong side of the abacus.
According to eMarketer, X revenues (including subscription and ad income) will rise to $2.3 billion this year; higher than last year’s $1.9 billion, but still far less than its pre-acquisition income.
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Advertising has to be at the heart of publishers’ businesses in the digital age, but publishers have also been working hard to diversify their revenue streams and, hopefully, become less dependent on ads. Those efforts might be starting to bear fruit — fewer publishers are saying the vast majority of their revenue comes from advertising this year, compared with last year.
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Wall Street may be breathing a sigh of relief over the 90-day tariff pause but marketers aren’t joining the celebration. They’ve seen this movie before — temporary reprieves followed by fresh volatility. It’s precisely why they’ve been demanding more flexibility in their media deals, especially in the fast-shifting terrain of retail media.
That’s the real pressure point. Even with some tariffs paused, others remain very much alive. A 10% blanket hike on imports from roughly 75 countries plus a 125% tariff on Chinese goods still leaves marketers facing a potential 25% surge in cost, with no clear end in sight. The math hasn’t really changed. Higher costs mean fewer goods sold. And with fewer goods to possibly move, CPG marketers are asking the obvious question: Will they need to advertise as much at all?
No one has a firm answer yet. If anything, the sudden backtracking on the more aggressive tariffs only underscores the futility of trying to make marketing decisions in real time when the policy backdrop can change by the hour. The prevailing logic now looks like this: Wait as long as possible, and be ready to move the moment it counts.
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Earlier this week, Digiday reported that parties were trying to engineer a divestment of Yahoo’s demand-side platform, but who would buy such an asset, especially in this market?
Now that the hard yards of reporting have been done, it’s time to reflect on the subsequent output of ad tech’s chattering classes to assess the likely outcomes of such a process.
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The complaint that advertising isn’t focused on originality is a common one. Every few years, conversations about when the creative was wild and innovative resurges. What’s different now is that creatives have even more threats to their livelihoods — the rise of AI, the rush to follow trends on social, squeezed budgets and now tariffs.
In the latest edition of our Confessions series, in which we trade anonymity for candor, we hear from a senior creative at a creative agency on originality.
This interview has been lightly edited and condensed for clarity.
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Apple has finally and officially released the iPhone 16 for customers in Indonesia. Not just the recently introduced iPhone 16e, but the whole lineup that was announced last fall. New iPhones typically don’t take more than 200 days to reach other markets. However, the Indonesian government forced Apple to pay for the opportunity to bring the latest iPhone technology to customers in its country.
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