Modi has been around long enough to have navigated trade frictions during Trump’s first term, and he was one of the first world leaders to approach Trump earlier this year with a conciliatory approach to growing trade tensions. Now, according to US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, the first phase of a new US-India trade deal might be “one of the first trade deals we would sign." Following a visit to Washington last week, Rajesh Agrawal, India’s lead trade negotiator, highlighted hopes for a “mutually beneficial, multi-sector bilateral trade agreement by fall of 2025, including through opportunities for early mutual wins.” Creating more market openings for US exports will come at a cost in a country long known for trade protectionism, but Modi has also made moves in recent years to open trade talks with the EU, the UK, and others.
This also follows news that, to avoid the Trump administration’s surging tariff rates on China, Apple has unveiled plans to move production of most of the 60 million iPhones it sells in the US each year from China to India by the end of 2026 – though the transition may take longer.What We're Watching
A winner from Trump tariff wars? Maybe India
U.S. President Donald Trump and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi shake hands as they attend a joint press conference at the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., February 13, 2025.
REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque
By Willis SparksApril 29, 2025
Willis Sparks
Willis Sparks is a senior editor for GZERO Daily. He is also a Director in the Global Macro practice at Eurasia Group, where he has worked since 2005. He has made speeches on international politics on every continent except Antarctica. Willis holds degrees from Brown University, the Juilliard School, Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs, and the Institut d'Etudes Politiques in Paris. He also holds an honorary degree from the Moscow Art Theatre School. A native of Macon, Georgia, Willis has worked as a stuntman at New York's Metropolitan Opera. As a child, he declined an opportunity to spend an afternoon riding the Great American Scream Machine, a rollercoaster, with Ronald McDonald, for money. He has never regretted that decision.
