U.S. President Donald Trump said that he plans to implement a 50% tariff on all copper imports, causing the biggest single-day increase in copper futures since 1989. CBS News MoneyWatch correspondent Kelly O'Grady breaks down the tariff's impact.

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Donald Trump has signed an order to impose tariffs imports into the U.S. from countries including China, Mexico and Canada.

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U.S. President Donald Trump has announced a plan to implement a 50% tariff on all copper imports. This announcement caused copper futures to experience their largest single-day increase since 1989. The United States currently produces about half of the copper it uses, with the remainder imported from other countries.

Copper is a critical material used in various industries, including electronics, automobiles, and the electrical grid. The proposed tariff is expected to increase input costs for manufacturers and could lead to higher prices for goods and energy. The administration cites national security as a reason for the move, emphasizing the importance of domestic copper production.

Breaking down Trump's plan to implement 50% copper tariff

Now let's go to CBS News Money Watch correspondent, Kelly O'Grady. Good to see you today, Kelly. What would the trickle-down effect look like for consumers when we talk about tariffs and also the tariffs on copper, when that goes into effect? Can you tell us more about that? Yeah, well, with the ones that just dropped mere seconds ago, I mean, you think about the types of things that we get from these countries, the letters that just went out, Philippines, Moldova, Iraq, Algeria, Brunei, you know, the really big one there and big as a relative term is Philippines. We get a lot of clothing, things like that from over there. That's going to be a 20% tariff. The trickle-down effect will come likely in the next few months. Remember, that doesn't go into effect until August 1st. And we are still waiting to see sort of the bigger effects of the tariffs that went into place a little bit ago, a couple of months ago, because companies sort of fret loaded. So that's sort of the impact there. You asked about copper, though, and that's a big one because yesterday the president did threaten to put a 50% tariff on copper, on all imported copper coming into the U.S. We make about a half of the copper that we use here in the States. Remember, we've also got sectoral tariffs on things like aluminum and steel. So this wasn't completely unexpected, but it's very important because copper is such a critical component of nearly everything that you can imagine. I mean, refrigerators, cars, electronics. You think about the telecommunications system. A lot of that is actually transferred over copper. When it comes to electricity, copper is very conductive. It's a very important component of our electrical grid. And yesterday, when those tariffs were mentioned, you saw the copper market, what we like to call copper futures, hit a record, the biggest single day increase since 1989. And so what does that mean? You're going to see the price for input materials go up, and that's really important when it comes to all the things that I just mentioned, but also the manufacturing industry. The final piece that sort of sent my spidey senses up when I heard copper, I went, wow, OK, well, copper is a really important thing when it comes to electricity and our electrical grid. What is going to be a huge draw on our electrical grid? AI, data centers. We have heard ad nauseum that AI is going to require so much energy, so much electricity, stuff that we don't have right now, essentially, when you think about what we're going to need over the next 10 plus years. And so now you increase the price of something that's really critical to that, you start to think, oh, maybe prices will go up for energy, electricity. Now, all that said, I do understand where the president is coming from, from a national security perspective. I just mentioned why copper is so important to all of these industries. There is an argument to say, well, we want to have most of that that you use manufactured in the States. I feel like I just learned so much about copper that I never knew about before. So Kelly O'Grady, thank you for that lesson. We really appreciate that. Thanks so much. OK.

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Breaking down Trump's plan to implement 50% copper tariff

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