Washington has lowered planned tariffs on two French overseas territories initially listed as facing swinging import levies earlier this week, AFP saw Friday.

The saying goes that when America sneezes the rest of the world catches a cold — pithy shorthand to describe how changes in the world’s biggest economy ripple out to impact everyone else.

A 10% 'baseline' tariff came into place past midnight, hitting most US imports except goods from Mexico and Canada as Trump ...