Navigating ”secondary tariffs” in global energy markets

US President Trump has threatened to impose “secondary tariffs” at a rate of 25% on countries that purchase crude oil from Venezuela, aiming to stymie its oil trade with other nations. The move is seen as a novel dimension in the new US administrations policy toolkit to use as leverage in achieving its foreign and domestic policy goals.

Ehsan Khoman, Head of Research – Commodities, ESG and Emerging Markets (EMEA), discusses the reverberations of these “secondary tariffs” and offers reasons to believe why the gravitational tilt for oil prices remains to the downside despite the risks of a removal of crude barrels from global oil markets.