How to deal with US tariffs – “read the news first and drink the coffee later”
The rules for international business are in flux, and the impacts can be hard to grasp. In the session titled “US and global policy shifts – and how to manage their treasury impact” at the recent Treasury 360° Nordic 2025 conference, Candida Wolff, Global Head of Government Affairs at Citi and Stefan Daberius, Group Treasurer at Ericsson, provided valuable insights to navigating the new geopolitical environment.
“There are some mornings when you wake up, you have your morning coffee, read the news, and then you choke on the coffee… So I’ve learnt to adapt – I read the news first and drink the coffee later,” Daberius jokes.
And while drinking that coffee, he is staying calm and collected. “It’s important not to make hasty decisions that have long-term implications because the visibility is just too low at the moment… You have this classic quote from Keynes (economist John Maynard Keynes), who said, ‘if facts change, I change my mind’. The facts have changed – but we don’t know yet to what degree and how much, so you just have to wait.”
Wolff described the Trump administration as having a “hyper-maximalist” approach that can be summarised by “four Ds” – dominate, disrupt, and disorient in the first four months, followed by dealmaking. She believes that the president has started to pivot to the fourth and final “D” of dealmaking.
“There needs to be some stabilising of the economy, and he needs to get the accomplishments. The accomplishments are not simply about disrupting. They are about the capacity to build back new structures after changes to the US federal government, after disruption to the global trade system. How do you build back those and create deals that will put in place the structure that the US will follow going forward? That’s the piece that I think we’re all trying to interpret and figure out.”
Breakups are not easy
Like Daberius, she recommends sitting tight; the bad times cannot last forever. She pointed out that there are only 150 people in the US Trade Representative’s office – not enough to negotiate the individual deals Trump wants within the 90-day pause on the tariffs. “It’s sometimes difficult to rebuild what you’ve broken up because you’ve got to have personnel, processes, and time… The process in place today is not going to be sustainable.”
“Remember that in Washington, 24 hours is a long time. Wait, wake up again, take a look, because some things might have shifted. Don’t overreact; see where the pressures are going to go.”
Panellists:
Candida Wolff, Global Head of Government Affairs, Citi
Stefan Daberius, Group Treasurer, Ericsson
Moderator:
Erik Savola, Nordic Head, Citi
• News from Treasury 360° Nordic 2025, at Stockholmsmässan on 22 May, is gathered here.
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