A trade war has erupted – and now the whole world is at stake.
Who pulled the trigger first – presumably the United States – remains for history to decide. What is clear, however, is that this is no small skirmish. It could reshape the global economic playing field. Will the storm last weeks, months, or years? Who will emerge victorious, who will barely survive – and who will be left behind?
In this thread, we delve into the economic impacts of the trade war – on stock markets, shares, macroeconomics, and how investors can navigate this new world. Fact-based forecasts, analyses, and even historical comparisons are more than welcome.
Since we are on an investment forum, I hope this discussion will primarily serve us investors: ideas, perspectives, and thoughts that can help make better decisions in an uncertain market.
The discussion can and should be multi-dimensional. One purpose is also to slightly lighten the discussion load from other threads – whether it’s the “Direction of the Stock Markets” thread, the coffee room, or the meme thread – well, not quite 
Here, however, we will stay focused: on serious and constructive economic discussion.
Edit: In the thread title, Tariff War → Trade War, because on April 14, 2025, China introduced export restrictions on rare earth metals and import restrictions on aircraft parts, and on April 15, 2025, the USA expanded export restrictions on Nvidia chips to China.
Tariff War Underway – But What About Software?
I’ll start the thread from my own perspective, which might open up a slightly new angle to the entire tariff discussion: software and intangible products.
Physical goods are subject to tariffs. Intangible products – software, cloud services, digital content – cross borders almost unimpeded. This gives a huge advantage to international software giants like Microsoft and partners. But what if this advantage disappears?
Before, everything was hardware
*Do you remember a time when computers were bought as machines – as mere hardware? You’d assemble the motherboard, CPU, memory, graphics card – and then go separately to buy Windows or even Doom on floppy disks. The whole package would be tariffable goods in today’s world.
Now everything is in the cloud
- But what happened? Software detached from devices. It moved online, to the cloud, as subscription services. Physical media disappeared.
- No tariffs – no border control. This is a priceless competitive advantage for companies.
Cars are the new computer
- Modern cars contain a vast amount of software.
- Features can be activated as a service afterward – they are intangible and often tariff-free.
Towards new structures?
- What if a car could be bought without software – as just a shell? As a mere mechanical platform, without “intelligence”? And everything else would come as separate cloud services – without tariffs. Car manufacturers could push the device price down and shift value to the intangible. What would be the right ratio? Is 50% of the device price still an exaggeration?
- The same is repeated in many other devices. Is intelligence bought separately, tariff-free?
Pandora’s Box: Tariffs on Software?
- The Trump administration handed the EU Pandora’s Box. If opened, the consequences could extend deep into the structures of the entire digital economy.
How do you see the situation?
- Is the tariff-free status of software threatened in the future?
- Could the logic of tariffs be extended to intangible goods?
- How much of the value of products can be hidden behind software?
- Would Trump be willing to throw MAG7 software under the bus and make a deal where the EU removes all tariffs on American goods but imposes fees on software? MAGA supporters would probably be fine with that.
Comment, question, ponder – we are talking about a big issue now.
