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The global trade system is undergoing an enormous, systemic paradigm shift. For decades, the World Trade Organization (WTO), with the support of the United States, its traditional European allies, and many other nations, stood at the center of efforts to create fairer, more predictable, and rules-based commerce. Today, however, that model is giving way to a more fragmented reality—so far U.S.-driven—in which individual nations and blocs are striking deals and imposing a variety of rules of their own liking.
President Trump launched this trend as far back as 2017 by questioning the value of multilateral institutions and placing greater emphasis on bilateral agreements. This was generally true during his first term, with the signature example in trade being the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement that he proposed and secured.
The second Trump administration has pursued this approach with even greater zeal, ignoring the WTO and existing trade agreements and instead imposing new U.S. tariff regimes on a country-by-country, region-by-region, and sector-by-sector basis.
The result is that the WTO is no longer the anchor of global trade, and companies must navigate a complicated patchwork of overlapping rules, tariffs, and compliance requirements, and all of them are in flux.
To continue reading this article, which originally appeared in the October 2025 edition of PCB007 Magazine, click here.
