Catenaa, Saturday, April 19, 2025- Apple and Nvidia stocks have been in the forefront of Trump’s trade war, shedding $ 1 trillion in market cap collectively since liberation day.
The two tech stocks’ volatility since Trump’s “Liberation Day” reciprocal tariff announcement on April 2, shows how the investors are battling the ever -changing uncertainty in the US economy.
Apple was initially the biggest loser from the trade rules, with some 90% of its iPhones made in China, as the company led big tech stocks down in the days following the reciprocal tariff announcement, shedding as much as $773 billion from its market cap.
A tariff exemption for some consumer electronics — covering basically all of Apple’s products — announced late last Friday by US Customs and Border Protection relieved some pressure on the stock earlier this week, with shares of Apple rising by 3.45% in the last five trading days that ended on Thursday.
Apple’s recovery helped stem its market cap losses and briefly put its value back above $3 trillion.
Nvidia saw its stock going down by 7% on Wednesday and over 2.8% on Thursday as the company disclosed on late Tuesday that the US government has effectively banned exports of its specialized chips to China.
Though the AI chipmaker has lost a lower share of its value than Apple since April 2, most of the pain came this week as the company’s market cap dropped 8%, or $230 billion. Over that same period, Apple stock was down only fractionally.
Trump so far has enacted a 10% tariff on all global imports, which went into effect on April 5.
His “reciprocal” tariffs initially set to take effect April 9 were paused for 90 days, with the exception of a 145% duty on Chinese imports.
Past week, The Commerce Department opened a probe into computer chips under a law that grants the president the ability to impose levies on imports due to national security.
And Trump has promised that most electronics will still get wrapped up in his tariffs, which could hurt Nvidia, Apple, and other Big Tech firms.
