“Right now, I’m not going badly for advising French companies,” said a business lawyer in the United States

President Donald Trump will sign the expected decree on reciprocal customs duties on Thursday. A trade war that confuses French companies brought to use American business lawyers.

Donald Trump promised to reply to the retaliatory measures taken by the EU, China and Canada on Wednesday March 12. These countries have indeed announced systems to counter the White House decision to tax 25% steel and aluminum imported in the United States. Donald Trump explains wanting to protect American companies, but this aggressive protectionism of the American president mainly destabilizes trade with his country.

In the meantime, French companies no longer know which saint to continue working on the American market. Franceinfo met a business lawyer in Atlanta, now overwhelmed by these announcements.

He has lived in the United States for 37 years and advises French companies on the American market, however Dominique Lemoine does not remember having experienced such economic uncertainty. “At the moment, I spend a lot of time advising French companies on clauses and amendments to bring to contracts, to propose to their contractors, so that they can repercuss the new price if a customs right is imposed on them compared to the contractual price they had already accepted”.

Because if taxes on the border increase, who must pay them? Foreign countries claims Donald Trump, except in reality, it is much more complicated. Often, American importing companies will have repercussions on the sale taxes.“There is no question, it is the consumer who will pay, Slice the lawyer. And then, among the voters of Donald Trump, there will be a lot of disappointed Trumpism because they believed, as they were told, that it would be the Chinese who would pay, and finally they find themselves paying and often they are quite disadvantaged people. “

What is certain for this business lawyer is that if Donald Trump blows hot and cold and multiplies the ever more threatening announcements on customs duties, it is to negotiate something with other countries. “On the other hand, we sometimes have trouble determining what he tries to negotiate”he explains.

“It is quite difficult to analyze what is happening when the person you are trying to analyze is not logical. I’m not even sure that he knows what he wants himself.”

Dominique Lemoine

in franceinfo

Dominique Lemoine affirms, in this uncertain and inamicial climate, French companies are likely to give up doing business on the American market, such as industrialists or car manufacturers.

But above all he advises his customers to make his back. “It is obvious that it will crack. It is obvious that there will be a recession, there will be unemployment and there is a fairly short window because the midterms are in 18 months and in 2026, if it continues like that, the Republicans will have a very bad surprise during the day of the elections”.

Most likely, it is therefore that Donald Trump recently announced that he no longer needs to increase customs duties because he will have obtained concessions from other countries, exactly what he had done during his first mandate.