Brussels has so far played by the traditional trade-war rulebook, matching Trump’s broader tariffs on the industrial metals with equivalent levies on iconic American brands like Harley-Davidson. The tit-for-tat response is intended to match, or “mirror,” the administration's moves — but not to escalate.
Now, with Washington threatening to punish the EU further, not only for its existing tariffs but also for what it sees as nontariff barriers such as its tech regulations, Brussels is preparing to up the ante.
In targeting U.S. services, Brussels could be thinking of bulge-bracket banks like J.P. Morgan or Bank of America, or tech players like Elon Musk’s social network X, search giant Google, or Amazon, the world’s largest online retailer.
“We are certainly not excluding a bigger response, a better response and an even more creative response through services, through [intellectual property rights],” a senior European Union official told reporters in mid-March.
“All these options are on the table today.”
The EU is a net exporter of automobiles, pharmaceuticals and food to the U.S. But it’s a net importer of services — and that gives it more leverage in a trade dispute. (Taking goods and services together, transatlantic trade is actually broadly in balance. The EU enjoys an overall surplus of just $50 billion, or about 3 percent of the $1.7 trillion in annual transatlantic commerce.)