Trade World — Despite Trump's Tariffs, Global Commerce Just Keeps on Growing

**Global trade volumes rose more than 4% in 2025, the fastest pace since the pandemic recovery. The U.S. may have erected walls, but the rest of the world built bridges.**

If you believed the headlines, you'd think global trade was on life support. President Trump's tariffs have been called a "wrecking ball" to the global trading system. The U.S. has imposed the highest import duties in decades, briefly hit China with triple-digit rates, and thrown the future of North American trade into doubt .

Yet somehow, global commerce just keeps growing.

## The Numbers That Defy the Narrative

Merchandise trade volumes rose by more than **4%** in 2025—"strong by the standards of the past decade," according to Capital Economics . The WTO puts the figure at **4.6%**, the fastest growth since the pandemic-recovery year of 2021 .

In November 2025 alone, global goods trade jumped **5.3%** year-over-year . In real terms, global trade growth in 2025 outpaced every year since 2017, excluding the anomalous 2021 rebound .

The message from the data is unambiguous: the global trading system is far more resilient than the headlines suggest.

## Why Trade Keeps Growing Despite Tariffs

### 1. The U.S. Is an Exception, Not a Rule

As the U.S. has embraced protectionism, few countries have followed its example. "Not only have countries mostly refrained from retaliating to U.S. tariffs—in contrast to the 1930s—but they have displayed little appetite for raising barriers with other trade partners," wrote Capital Economics' Simon MacAdam .

The rest of the world is doing the opposite: liberalizing, integrating, and deepening relationships to counter a volatile Trump administration .

In January 2026, the EU and South America's Mercosur bloc signed a landmark free trade agreement . The UK joined the CPTPP, and the African Continental Free Trade Area secured its 49th ratification . China's share of U.S. imports has fallen from 21% in 2017 to just 9% in 2025, but China's exports have simply rerouted—not collapsed .

### 2. Trade Finds a Way

"Trade is like water. It will always find a way," DHL Express CEO John Pearson declared in March 2026 .

When the U.S. raises walls, supply chains shift. Southeast Asian nations like Thailand and Vietnam have absorbed a wave of orders that once went to China . Chinese exports to Europe and emerging markets surged, particularly in higher-value products like electric vehicles and industrial components . Chinese shipments of memory chips rose **9%** in 2025, fueled by global AI demand and exports to markets beyond the U.S. .

### 3. The AI Investment Boom

The artificial intelligence buildout has created a deluge of computer chips and equipment criss-crossing the globe. The U.S. import surge in semiconductors and related products offset declines in other manufactured goods .

### 4. Falling Costs of Moving Goods

Even as political barriers rise, the physical cost of moving goods continues to fall. Fiber-optic cables are multiplying and growing more powerful. In 2025, the Bifrost cable connecting Singapore to California can carry 32.5 terabits per second—more than all 111 world cables in 2010 combined . Operating satellites have surged from roughly 11,500 to 18,000 in just two years .

## The Limits of Resilience

This isn't to say trade is invincible. The blockage of the Strait of Hormuz and the destruction of energy infrastructure in the Middle East have created a new challenge, threatening the flow of oil, gas, and fertilizer critical to global agriculture . WTO Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala warned that the baseline forecast for continued trade growth "is under pressure from the conflict in the Middle East" .

As McKinsey partner Olivia White put it: "Just because a trade network can be robust, self-healing and adapt to a lot of shocks doesn't mean that it can be robust to every shock" .

## What This Means for the U.S.

The U.S. is trading less. Virtually everyone else is trading more. The American share of global imports has held at about 13%, and U.S. exports at about 10% . But the country's share of global trade is slowly eroding as others deepen their integration.

The lesson is as old as commerce itself: when you build walls, the world routes around them. As one economist put it, "The only free lunch in economics is diversification" .

The global trading system has been tested by a president who promised to tear it down. So far, it has bent—but it has not broken. The tariffs remain a threat, but the system's capacity to adapt has proved far greater than the critics imagined.

---

**Disclaimer:** *This article is for informational and educational purposes only and does not constitute financial, investment, or policy advice. Trade data, tariff policies, and geopolitical conditions are subject to change. The views expressed are based on publicly available reports and analysis as of September 2026.*