As one can perhaps perceive, Trump’s debts and some of his policies are about self-dealing and more recently tax exposure prosecution. If he can avoid China calling in his personal real estate loans, one of his numerous follies can be kept at bay. Because only under kleptocracy are there bribes. A China trade war contains both important policy demands and some obvious shorter-term benefits for certain class interests. Today’s failed trade negotiations and new tariffs now add a de facto US consumer tax.
For example, an office building on Avenue of the Americas in Manhattan, of which Mr. Trump is part owner, carries a $950 million loan (from Bank of China).
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Within three days of the Chinese government agreeing to provide $500 million in loans to an Indonesian theme park that the Trump Organization has a deal to license President Donald Trump's name.
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“He will essentially force the Chinese government to retaliate in other ways — and those other ways can be much more costly to American firms,” he said. “That belief is premised on a fundamentally erroneous assumption about how the modern economy works … and a lack of concern with how engaged American businesses are involved already in China.”
American manufacturers like automakers have made considerable investments into manufacturing facilities in China, and the financial and professional services sectors have a large and profitable presence there. These and other multinationals operating in China are vulnerable to a wide array of actions the government could take against them.
For example, Chinese officials could slow the customs process for U.S. products entering the country, launch investigations into or spring inspections onto factories, hotels or other businesses — all activities for which a veneer of plausible deniability would make proving a punitive motive difficult. The Chinese government could restrict access to its market by stopping American business investment or, if the situation worsened, mandate that they divest entirely, said Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Analytics.