With the upcoming US President Donald Trump's trade policies, including tariffs, several industries are fearing major changes and adjustments that could affect their business operations.
However, not all sectors were affected equally. Some industries will remain largely unaffected or even thrive despite the trade disruptions, thanks to their business models or strategic operations. Here are five industries that can weather the storm of Trump's tariffs.
Technology and Software
The technology and software industries were almost free from the impact of tariffs. The tariffs, especially those related to the physical importing of goods, will hardly make any impact on the companies. However, hardware manufacturers will incur high costs on some components, software companies, cloud services, and digital platforms to avoid tariff-related disruptions. Plus, some global companies, like Nvidia, will not be exempted from retaliation thrown by countries hit with tariffs.
Financial Services
Banks, insurance, and investment houses, will be minimally affected. This is because the business is essentially based on services and financial transactions rather than on physical products, meaning that the increase in tariffs for imports did not directly affect their business.
This industry heavily relies on services, which are not dependent on physical products that would have received taxes under trade tariffs, per the United States Trade Representative.
Healthcare and Pharmaceuticals
Health and pharmaceutical sectors remained relatively out of bounds to the impact of Trump's tariffs, at least until the last gasp.
However, the Tax Foundation noted that the majority of raw materials, mainly sourced from China, received an increase in tariffs, while the majority of pharmaceutical products and most medical devices remained either outside the ambit of tariffs or were barely touched. The pharma business is largely founded on intellectual property, and the United States has domestic manufacturing for most of its medical supplies.
As a result, the industry can still produce and distribute essential products while firms are able to pass through minimal cost increases to consumers. More importantly, medical services and health, largely service-based, will be less exposed to the tariff restrictions which weighed on other parts of the economy.
Energy
The energy sector, especially oil and natural gas, was hardly impacted by tariffs, at least in the context of US domestic production. The United States has large reserves and production capabilities in oil and natural gas, which meant that the country's energy industry was not heavily reliant on imports that could be affected by tariffs. Global energy prices can fluctuate because of geopolitical factors. However, the imposition of tariffs on imported energy products will make little difference to US energy companies.
Entertainment and Media
The entertainment and media sectors are mostly centered on intellectual property, creativity, and services rather than the manufacture of physical goods, the impact was not as significant for such sectors that relied heavily on imported materials. With or without tariffs, the entertainment industry still continues to export movies and music with high demand globally which has insulated this sector against the impacts of tariffs, although they will not escape imposed taxes, per Media Defence.
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