Which Sectors Will Be Hit Hardest by Trump’s Tariffs on Mexico, Canada and China?

President Donald Trump on Tuesday went through with threats to tax imports from America’s three largest trading partners, a move that experts say could scramble supply chains and raise prices for U.S. consumers.

The U.S. now charges a 25% tariff on Canadian and Mexican imports and increase tariffs on Chinese goods to 20% from 10%. Canada and China quickly announced retaliatory measures, while Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said Mexico would respond on Sunday.

The tariffs and counter-tariffs are expected to shrink American, Canadian and Mexican gross domestic products, and lead to job losses in all three countries. The impacts, though, will be uneven, with Canada and Mexico expected to be hit much harder than the U.S.

But American businesses, especially in sectors that depend on deeply integrated North American supply chains and inexpensive Chinese goods, will feel their fair share of pain.

Carmakers

Tariffs are expected to dramatically increase costs for automakers Ford (F), General Motors (GM), and Stellantis (STLA).

All three manufacture parts and assemble cars in factories across North America. The North American auto industry is so intertwined that the U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration doesn’t even distinguish between Canadian-made and American-made parts when calculating how much of each car is domestic.

Canada and Mexico accounted for 47% of U.S. automobile imports and 54% of car parts imports in 2023. They’re also major markets for U.S. auto exports, with the two receiving 75% of America’s exported car parts that year.

Bloomberg Intelligence analyst Michael Dean on Tuesday estimated that Stellantis alone could take a 3.44 billion euro hit to its earnings this year. Shares of the Jeep and Chrysler maker fell more than 4% Tuesday. General Motors shares also lost 4%, while Ford slipped about 3%.

Homebuilders

Tariffs could worsen America’s housing shortage and affordability crisis. 

Canadian lumber, Chinese steel and Mexican and Canadian concrete are just some of the imported materials that go into U.S. homes and commercial properties. CoreLogic estimates that tariffs would increase homebuilding costs by 4% to 6% in the next 12 months. That’s in addition to standard price increases, meaning the total increase could be as much as 10%. 

The average home currently costs about $422,000 to build. That’s already far more than the average American can afford, leaving homebuilders little room to pass tariff-induced inflation along to buyers. 

Construction costs accounted for more than 64% of homebuilding expenses in 2024, the highest share since the National Association of Home Builders began tracking the cost in 1998. The average homebuilder’s profit margin was about 11% last year. Rising construction costs and minimal pricing flexibility are expected to narrow those margins. 

Shares of D.R. Horton (DHI) and Lennar (LEN), two of America’s largest homebuilders, were up slightly on Tuesday but have each lost about 10% since the start of 2025.

Consumer Electronics

The U.S. imported more than half a trillion dollars worth of computers and economic products last year, about four times what it exported. Electronics imports—including $111 billion worth of cell phones and $116 billion worth of computers—were the single largest contributor to America’s $1.2 trillion trade deficit last year, according to Census Bureau data.

More than $200 billion worth of imported electronics came from Mexico and China last year, according to an NBC analysis of Census Bureau data.

Shares of Best Buy (BBY) plummeted on Tuesday after the electronics retailer’s CEO told analysts that about 75% of the products it sells were from China and Mexico. “We expect our vendors across our entire assortment will pass along some level of tariff costs to retailers, making price increases for American consumers highly likely,” he said. 

Oil

The energy sector is likely to see its costs increase as a result of Trump’s tariffs. 

Canada is America’s largest supplier of foreign oil, accounting for about 60% of all oil imports last year. While Canadian oil was given a carve-out on Tuesday—it will be taxed at 10% rather than 25%—higher importing costs will likely be felt in oil and gas prices. 

The U.S., the world’s largest oil producer, is a net exporter of crude oil. Still, if U.S. refiners were to stop buying Canadian oil altogether, the 1.5 billion barrels of crude the U.S. shipped abroad last year would just barely offset the shortfall. 

But American oil companies can’t simply stop buying Canadian oil. Refineries across the country—especially in the Midwest—are outfitted to process Canada’s heavy oil. It would take refineries years to upgrade their infrastructure to adapt to Tuesday’s tariffs.

Retailers

With so many of America’s finished consumer products—ranging from home appliances to toys—coming from China and Mexico, big retailers like Walmart (WMT), Target (TGT) and Costco (COST) will likely pay some of the price of Trump’s tariffs.

JPMorgan estimates more than 80% of the toys sold in America come from China. Retailers will also feel the pinch of high consumer electronics prices. And even Walmart’s growing grocery business could see higher costs, given Mexico sourced 40% of America’s imported fruit and nearly 50% of its imported vegetables in 2023.