Key Takeaways
• European Union steel exports to the United States fell by 34% year-on-year in the three quarters following the imposition of 50% US tariffs on June 4, 2025, dropping from 2.93 million metric tons to 1.94 million metric tons, representing a loss of approximately 990,000 metric tons of export volume that European producers have been unable to replace in alternative markets at equivalent commercial terms.
• Steel & aluminium remain the only sectors still subject to the full 50% US tariff rate under the broader EU-US trade arrangement, creating a structural inequity in which European steelmakers bear a disproportionate share of the commercial burden of transatlantic trade tensions while producers in other industries have secured more favorable treatment.
• The European Steel Association's Director General Axel Eggert has declared the current EU-US trade arrangement "worth nothing for the EU steel industry" in the absence of a concrete tariff solution, calling specifically for tariff-rate quota arrangements covering steel, aluminium, & steel-containing derivative products to restore commercially viable transatlantic market access.