Key Highlights

  • The WTO lifted its 2026 merchandise trade growth forecast to 3.9% from 1.9%, citing AI investment.
  • AI-related products made up 23% of US imports in 2025, facing a 4.5% effective Tariff against 12.1% for other goods.
  • AI-enabling goods accounted for 47% of global merchandise trade growth in the first half of 2026.
  • September's US goods Deficit was USD 135.9 billion and Capital Goods imports reached a record USD 158.0 billion.

Trade Outruns the Forecasts

Global trade has proved stronger than forecasters assumed, and the World Trade Organization attributes much of the strength to artificial intelligence. At a press conference in Geneva on Oct. 8, the WTO raised its 2026 forecast for merchandise trade growth to 3.9% from 1.9% in its spring outlook, and put 2027 growth at 4.1%. Merchandise trade grew 3.5% in the first half of 2026. AI-enabling goods, such as semiconductors and servers, accounted for 47% of that growth, and trade in them rose 67% from a year earlier, against 31% in 2025 and 16% in 2024. The organization's chief economist said forecasters had been surprised by the strength of AI investment.

The higher forecast came despite the conflict in the Middle East. Gulf exports of liquefied Natural Gas fell 47% in the first half, and crude exports dropped by nearly a quarter, although other suppliers limited the global declines to about 1% for gas and 6% for crude.

Nearly a Quarter of US Imports

The United States sits at the center of the AI trade. AI-related products accounted for 23% of all US imports in 2025, according to a study by Michael Waugh, an economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis. Imports of those products rose about 73% from 2023 to 2025, while all other imports rose 3%. In January 2026, imports outside the AI category were 14% below their typical 2023 level.

The study estimates that if AI trade had grown at the pace of other goods since 2023, the 2025 goods trade deficit, a record near USD 1.2 trillion, would have been about USD 194 billion, or nearly 16%, smaller. Taiwan and Mexico together accounted for about half of AI-related trade. Taiwan supplies semiconductors, while Mexico supplies computing equipment, electrical wiring and cooling systems. Mainland China's share of AI-related imports is below 10% and has fallen since 2023.

Tariffs That Mostly Miss the Buildout

The tariff wall has a gap where the buildout sits. The Minneapolis Fed study found an effective tariff rate of 4.5% on AI-related products at the end of 2025, against 12.1% on other goods, with about 69% of AI-related imports covered by at least one exemption list.

The one tariff aimed at AI chips is narrow. A proclamation dated Jan. 14 imposed a 25% tariff under Section 232 of trade law on a small category of advanced computing chips, with the Nvidia H200 and AMD MI325X named as examples in a White House fact sheet. It exempts chips imported for US data centers, repairs, research and development, startups, consumer and industrial uses and public-sector applications. The Congressional Research Service says it is unclear whether any chips imported for domestic use would pay the tariff, or whether it would reach only chips destined for re-export, such as to China.

What September's Trade Data Show

The Bureau of Economic Analysis reported on Nov. 4 that the combined goods and services deficit narrowed 0.7% in September to USD 105.0 billion, while total imports rose 1.2% to a record USD 426.6 billion. The goods deficit was USD 135.9 billion. Capital goods imports rose USD 11.6 billion to a record USD 158.0 billion, driven by the Data Center buildout, while semiconductor imports fell USD 1.2 billion.

Coverage of the report noted record goods deficits with Mexico, Vietnam, Taiwan and South Korea, and imports subtracted 2.64 percentage points from third-quarter GDP growth, the largest drag since the first quarter of 2025. Over the first nine months of 2026, the combined deficit was 12.2% below the same period of 2025, as exports rose 11.6% and imports 6.2%. The comparison is with a year when importers rushed orders ahead of tariffs.

The Cost of Taxing the Chips

Policy proposals show what is at stake. A Washington think tank, the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, modeled a blanket tariff on semiconductors in a report on June 24. Its model found that a 25% rate would raise prices of information and communications technology by 22.6% and cost the US economy about USD 1.6 trillion over ten years. The report noted that semiconductors account for more than half the cost of building and operating an AI data center, and that AI Investment was 1.2% of GDP in 2025. These are the foundation's model results, not a tariff in force.

What the Exemptions Leave Open

The evidence points to protectionism and trade growth running side by side, with AI hardware as the largest exception. A technology that governments want to build domestically is imported at low effective tariffs, and the same imports widen the goods deficit. The exemptions rest on proclamations and exemption lists, so the effective rate on AI goods is a policy setting, not a fixed feature of the system.

Several readings show how far the pattern extends. Monthly trade reports show whether capital goods imports keep setting records, and the origin data show whether Taiwan and Mexico remain the main suppliers as China's share keeps falling. Customs data on exemption claims would show how many chips actually pay the Section 232 tariff. The WTO's next outlook shows whether AI-enabling goods continue to Supply nearly half of trade growth once the first wave of data center construction is complete.