Trump Says Gold Won’t Be Tariffed, After Market Goes Wild

By Rob Bates | August 12, 2025

In a Truth Social post on Monday, President Trump announced that “Gold will not be Tariffed!”

He didn’t provide any additional information.

Trump’s post seemingly came in response to a July 31 letter from a U.S Customs and Border Protection (CBP) official to a Swiss refiner that stated that certain gold bars could face import tariffs—currently set at 39% for Switzerland.

The CBP letter sent gold futures soaring to record highs—and sparked enough uncertainly that the administration walked it back.

A White House official said on Friday that the administration will “issue an executive order in the near future clarifying misinformation about the tariffing of gold bars and other specialty products,” according to Agence France-Presse.

The president’s post about gold is not likely to apply to gold jewelry from India. Those imports are now subject to a 25% tariff, scheduled to increase to 50% on Aug. 27.

Sara Yood, president and CEO of the Jewelers Vigilance Committee, tells JCK: “There is one category of gold that is currently tariff-free because it is on the Annex II exemption list included in the original April executive order on tariffs—7108.1210, which is ‘gold, nonmonetary, bullion, and dore.’ A Swiss company applied for a Customs ruling about whether its gold bars fell into that category. On July 31, Customs issued a determination that the Swiss gold bars did not fall into that category, and therefore were subject to tariffs.

“While Trump has said on Truth Social—not an official government declaration—that gold will not be tariffed, I suspect that….they will add the gold bar HTS code to the exemption list, rather than making all gold products exempt from tariffs. We will need to wait for an executive order or other official government action to see what happens.”

As there’s been no word which rule applies to gold bar imports—the one cited by the Customs official or the one later announced by Trump—gold trade groups are seeking greater clarity too.

Christoph Wild, president of the Swiss Association of Manufacturers and Traders in Precious Metals (ASFCMP), said in a news release that “President Trump’s statement is an encouraging signal for trade stability. However, only a formal and binding decision will provide the certainty the gold sector and its partners require.”

The World Gold Council made a similar statement to JCK: “The past week has created an abundance of questions and concerns about the direct implications of tariffs on gold access in the U.S. market. Yesterday, the president specifically stated gold will not be tariffed. At this stage, we await a formal confirmation and further details.”

Other in the industry are less concerned. Torry Hoover, president of Hoover & Strong, the North Chesterfield, Va.–based refiner, says the levy will have little effect on his company, as it doesn’t import any gold bars. His business has only been helped by the trade war, says Hoover.

“The only negative with [a] tariff on gold bullion will be if it further drives the price of fine gold higher,” he says. “The jewelry industry isn’t the main consumer of Credit Suisse bars, it’s the banks that have been consuming and driving up the price of gold, as they have shifted from the U.S. dollar to gold. The jewelry industry is not the cause of gold market prices, just a bystander.”

At press time, gold was trading at $3,350 an ounce.

(Photo: Getty Images)