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A millennial is building America’s first nickel-cobalt refinery

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Kaleigh Long believed there had to be an American fix. As an Oklahoman working on political campaigns in the Democratic Republic of Congo she saw all too closely the bloodiness of the critical-mineral trade. Militias killed her flatmate’s siblings, burnt homes on resource-rich land and forced children to dig in the mines—as Chinese companies tolerated the abuses.

Back home the 28-year-old single mother reckoned that getting into the mineral business was the best way to clean up the supply chain and ease China’s chokehold on cobalt and other minerals vital to a greener economy. America had no nickel-cobalt refineries of its own. In early 2022 Ms Long set out to build its first. She raised $50m for her startup, Westwin Elements, and recruited oil-and-gas tycoons, a former intelligence officer and the longtime boss of Boeing, an aerospace company, to sit on her board. In her Oklahoma City headquarters the self-described libertarian touched her necklace, the pendant a silhouette of Africa, as she spoke about the $185m grant Westwin next hopes to win from the Department of Energy.

Westwin’s ambitions show the promise of the largesse doled out by the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), Joe Biden’s signature bill to catalyse America’s clean-energy transition. Subsidies for electric cars attracted $110bn in investments in green manufacturing and battery-making within a year of the IRA’s passage in 2022. But as firms boosted production it became clear that China’s grip on the world’s mineral mines and refineries could prove perilous for its political foes. If China decides not to export refined metals tomorrow, as it has threatened to do, dozens of brand-new American gigafactories could soon sit idle.

Even with subsidies, mining and refining in America are not for the faint of heart. Regulations can make both activities uncompetitive. But the maths flipped in refiners’ favour in December 2023 when the tax agencies charged with implementing the IRA made it more protectionist. Their new rules clarified that companies selling electric cars made with materials processed by firms with at least 25% Chinese ownership are ineligible for subsidies. For makers of batteries and cars this was bad news—their inputs got pricier overnight. But for Ms Long it meant that her higher-cost product would have a market.

Drive 90 miles south-west of Oklahoma City through fields of cotton and cattle and you will find yourself at the construction site of Westwin’s pilot plant in Lawton. A steel skeleton of the refinery sits on a 40-acre plot framing the Wichita mountain-range; on a February morning engineers buzzed around it in hard hats. By 2030 Westwin plans to produce 64,000 metric tonnes of processed nickel and—if it can find ethical suppliers and sell the refined product without crashing the price—20,000 tonnes of cobalt. According to calculations by Daniel Quiggin of Chatham House, a British think-tank, that would meet roughly half of America’s demand for electric-car batteries. For building the supply chain “projects like this are indispensable,” says Bentley Allan, a professor at Johns Hopkins University.

Blood, sweat and fears

But in leaving Congo for America’s prairies Ms Long finds herself still haunted by ethical problems. By building in Oklahoma she inserted her project in the middle of a bitter row over indigenous rights. Leaders of the Apache, Comanche and Kiowa nations say the plant comes too close to their sovereign land and that the firm’s failure to consult them before building shows the same disrespect as settlers past. They fear that contamination from the refinery will give their babies cancer and dirty their sacred land and air. Having lost countless kin to covid-19 they refuse to back it without a guarantee that it will not make their people sick. Westwin cannot make that promise.

The protests echo those mounted against the Keystone XL oil pipeline in the Dakotas. At a sweat ceremony on a recent winter evening, between prayers for locked-up loved ones and addicted brothers, native residents pleaded for Westwin to stop construction. As an elder poured water on embers the hut filled with steam and became so hot your correspondent struggled to breathe. In darkness they sang and passed a tobacco pipe between them, the smoke a vehicle to lift their anti-industrial supplications “to the spirits”.

The next day the tribal chairmen met with Westwin executives. Lawton locals who attended had no patience for Ms Long’s tearful tale of child-slaves in the Congolese cobalt mines—indigenous people, she noted, just on a different continent—and no interest in what her project means for American national security.

Because they lack the muscle of richer tribes to the east who lobby more, their objections are probably for naught. But the distress of it all may in the end convince Ms Long not to build the commercial plant in her home state, especially if Texas or Louisiana offer better tax breaks.

The permitting process could be long and litigious in any of those places and the delay may undermine climate goals. As long as domestic refineries are not yet up and running and China’s mineral stash is still on offer, the IRA’s protectionist rules could slow progress towards decarbonisation, says Tom Moerenhout of Columbia University who advises the State Department and White House on energy policy.

Since hawkishness towards China is trendy in both parties, and most of the investments have gone to Republican districts, it is a fair bet that any future president will keep the subsidies in place. That comforts Ms Long, who says she worries about the risks facing her business “almost every day, most of the day”. Though many are cheering her on, Westwin has already shown just how hard it is to bring critical-mineral refining to America, never mind an ethical model for the world.

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Economics

Trump tariffs’ effect on consumer prices debated by economists

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The U.S. government is set to increase tariff rates on several categories of imported products. Some economists tracking these trade proposals say the higher tariff rates could lead to higher consumer prices.

One model constructed by the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston suggests that in an “extreme” scenario, heightened taxes on U.S. imports could result in a 1.4 percentage point to 2.2 percentage point increase to core inflation. This scenario assumes 60% tariff rates on Chinese imports and 10% tariff rates on imports from all other countries.

The researchers note that many other tariff proposals have surfaced since they published their findings in February 2025. 

Price increases could come across many categories, including new housing and automobiles, alongside consumer services such as nursing, public transportation and finance. 

“People might think, ‘Oh, tariffs can only affect the goods that I buy. It can’t affect the services,'” said Hillary Stein, an economist at the Boston Fed. “Those hospitals are buying inputs that might be, for example, … medical equipment that comes from abroad.” 

White House economists say tariffs will not meaningfully contribute to inflation. In a statement to CNBC, Stephen Miran, chair of the Council of Economic Advisers, said that “as the world’s largest source of consumer demand, the U.S. holds all the leverage, which means foreign suppliers will have to eat the economic burden or ‘incidence’ of the tariffs.” 

Assessing the impact of the administration’s full economic agenda has been a challenge for central bank leaders. The Federal Open Market Committee decided to leave its target for the federal funds rate unchanged at the meeting in March. 

The Fed targets its overnight borrowing rate at between 4.25% and 4.5%, with the effective federal funds rate at 4.33% on March 31, according to the New York Fed. The core personal consumption expenditures price index inflation rate rose to 2.8% in February, according to the Commerce Department. Forecasts of U.S. gross domestic product suggest that the economy will continue to grow at a 1.7% rate in 2025, albeit at a slower pace than what was forecast in January.  

Consumers in the U.S. and businesses around the world are bracing for impact. 
 
“There is a reason why companies went outside of the U.S.,” said Gregor Hirt, chief investment officer at Allianz Global Investors. “Most of the time it was because it was cheaper and more productive.” 

Watch the video above to learn how much inflation tariffs may cause.

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Trump’s tariff gambit will raise the stakes for an economy already looking fragile

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U.S. President Donald Trump speaks alongside entertainer Kid Rock before signing an executive order in the Oval Office of the White House on March 31, 2025 in Washington, DC. 

Andrew Harnik | Getty Images

President Donald Trump is set Wednesday to begin the biggest gamble of his nascent second term, wagering that broad-based tariffs on imports will jumpstart a new era for the U.S. economy.

The stakes couldn’t be higher.

As the president prepares his “liberation day” announcement, household sentiment is at multi-year lows. Consumers worry that the duties will spark another round of painful inflation, and investors are fretting that higher prices will mean lower profits and a tougher slog for the battered stock market.

What Trump is promising is a new economy not dependent on deficit spending, where Canada, Mexico, China and Europe no longer take advantage of the U.S. consumer’s desire for ever-cheaper products.

The big problem right now is no one outside the administration knows quite how those goals will be achieved, and what will be the price to pay.

“People always want everything to be done immediately and have to know exactly what’s going on,” said Joseph LaVorgna, who served as a senior economic advisor during Trump’s first term in office. “Negotiations themselves don’t work that way. Good things take time.”

For his part, LaVorgna, who is now chief economist at SMBC Nikko Securities, is optimistic Trump can pull it off, but understands why markets are rattled by the uncertainty of it all.

“This is a negotiation, and it needs to be judged in the fullness of time,” he said. “Eventually we’re going to get some details and some clarity, and to me, everything will fit together. But right now, we’re at that point where it’s just too soon to know exactly what the implementation is likely to look like.”

Here’s what we do know: The White House intends to implement “reciprocal” tariffs against its trading partners. In other words, the U.S. is going to match what other countries charge to import American goods into their countries. Most recently, a figure of 20% blanket tariffs has been bandied around, though LaVorgna said he expects the number to be around 10%, but something like 60% for China.

What is likely to emerge, though, will be far more nuanced as Trump seeks to reduce a record $131.4 billion U.S. trade deficit. Trump professes his ability to make deals, and the saber-rattling of draconian levies on other countries is all part of the strategy to get the best arrangement possible where more goods are manufactured domestically, boosting American jobs and providing a fairer landscape for trade.

The consequences, though, could be rough in the near term.

Potential inflation impact

On their surface, tariffs are a tax on imports and, theoretically, are inflationary. In practice, though, it doesn’t always work that way.

During his first term, Trump imposed heavy tariffs with nary a sign of longer-term inflation outside of isolated price increases. That’s how Federal Reserve economists generally view tariffs — a one-time “transitory” blip but rarely a generator of fundamental inflation.

This time, though, could be different as Trump attempts something on a scale not seen since the disastrous Smoot-Hawley tariffs in 1930 that kicked off a global trade war and would be the worst-case scenario of the president’s ambitions.

“This could be a major rewiring of the domestic economy and of the global economy, a la Thatcher, a la Reagan, where you get a more enabled private sector, streamlined government, a fair trading system,” Mohamed El-Erian, the Allianz chief economic advisor, said Tuesday on CNBC. “Alternatively, if we get tit-for-tat tariffs, we slip into stagflation, and that stagflation becomes well anchored, and that becomes problematic.”

Tariffs could be a major rewiring of the domestic and global economy, says Mohamed El-Erian

The U.S. economy already is showing signs of a stagflationary impulse, perhaps not along the lines of the 1970s and early ’80s but nevertheless one where growth is slowing and inflation is proving stickier than expected.

Goldman Sachs has lowered its projection for economic growth this year to barely positive. The firm is citing the “the sharp recent deterioration in household and business confidence” and second-order impacts of tariffs as administration officials are willing to trade lower growth in the near term for their longer-term trade goals.

Federal Reserve officials last month indicated an expectation of 1.7% gross domestic product growth this year; using the same metric, Goldman projects GDP to rise at just a 1% rate.

In addition, Goldman raised its recession risk to 35% this year, though it sees growth holding positive in the most-likely scenario.

Broader economic questions

However, Luke Tilley, chief economist at Wilmington Trust, thinks the recession risk is even higher at 40%, and not just because of tariff impacts.

“We were already on the pessimistic side of the spectrum,” he said. “A lot of that is coming from the fact that we didn’t think the consumer was strong enough heading into the year, and we see growth slowing because of the tariffs.”

Tilley also sees the labor market weakening as companies hold off on hiring as well as other decisions such as capital expenditure-type investments in their businesses.

That view on business hesitation was backed up Tuesday in an Institute for Supply Management survey in which respondents cited the uncertain climate as an obstacle to growth.

“Customers are pausing on new orders as a result of uncertainty regarding tariffs,” said a manager in the transportation equipment industry. “There is no clear direction from the administration on how they will be implemented, so it’s harder to project how they will affect business.”

While Tilley thinks the concern over tariffs causing long-term inflation is misplaced — Smoot-Hawley, for instance, actually ended up being deflationary — he does see them as a danger to an already-fragile consumer and economy as they could tend to weaken activity further.

“We think of the tariffs as just being such a weight on growth. It would drive up prices in the initial couple [inflation] readings, but it would create so much economic weakness that they would end up being net deflationary,” he said. “They’re a tax hike, they’re contractionary, they’re going to weigh on the economy.”

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Economics

Euro zone inflation, March 2025

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A man pushes his shopping cart filled with food shopping and walks in front of an aisle of canned vegetables with “Down price” labels in an Auchan supermarket in Guilherand Granges, France, March 8, 2025.

Nicolas Guyonnet | Afp | Getty Images

Annual Euro zone inflation dipped as expected to 2.2% in March, according to flash data from statistics agency Eurostat published Tuesday.

The Tuesday print sits just below the 2.3% final reading of February.

So called core-inflation, which excludes more volatile food, energy, alcohol and tobacco prices, edged lower to 2.4% in March from 2.6% in February. The closely watched services inflation print, which had long been sticky around the 4% mark, also fell to 3.4% in March from 3.7% in the preceding month.

Recent preliminary data had showed that March inflation came in lower than forecast in several major euro zone economies. Last month’s inflation hit 2.3% in Germany and fell to 2.2% in Spain, while staying unchanged at 0.9% in France.

The figures, which are harmonized across the euro area for comparability, boosted expectations for a further 25-basis-point interest rate cut from the European Central Bank during its upcoming meeting on April 17. Markets were pricing in an around 76% chance of such a reduction ahead of the release of the euro zone inflation data on Tuesday, according to LSEG data.

The European Union is set to be slapped with tariffs due in effect later this week from the U.S. administration of Donald Trump — including a 25% levy on imported cars.

While the exact impact of the tariffs and retaliatory measures remains uncertain, many economists have warned for months that their effect could be inflationary.

This is a breaking news story, please check back for updates.

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