Duty Calls: Custom(s) Fandom for Flexport's Tariff Talk
Disclaimer: Everything below is a mix of what I observed and heard during the event. The goal isn’t to pinpoint "who exactly said what," but to share (usually) an outsider's view and overall perspective on these industries. I’m not here to act as a definitive firsthand source—readers should do their own research. I hope this inspires you to attend events, explore new industries, and hear what leaders are presenting. These notes combine my observations with thoughts on how things could run smoother and how ideas connect (IMO). I’m not an expert, you know? Just hanging out in the room with them. Enjoy!Topics: Trade, Logistics, Shipping, Tariffs, Updates, Politics, Ships, Cargo
Lets learn about tariffs and see what’s going on in this ship-heavy world. This is a quick call they’re hosting and I randomly found it (from their CEO tweeting about it, so not super random) and I’d like to see waht I can learn about tariffs. After that, I jump onto my podcast with my friend Deven to talk about AMC, GME, and BBBYQ ——- and financial crime from the past hundreds of years + how its bigger and badder than ever lately.
Why Attend This: I’ll be blunt. I think Flexport is tied to the future GME mega corporation they’re building, Teddy. Tied to the Amazon competitor that RC is building? I learned about this from watching thousands of hours of videos and DD researching bbbyq, gamestop, and connections to Ryan Cohen and such. That plus a lot of other things. So, that’s why I’m a Flexport super fan. Cause i think the Ryans are working together to make the world amazing again. And… yeah!! Let’s see. I mean, I have been attending things to learn more about Flexport and shipping for a while. Just like a half a year ago I was attending stuff on our shipyards here in Seattle, trying to be a flexport-esq investigator of how shipping works hahaha. It’s just my casual obsession. Learning entire global systems and waiting for MOASS.
Notes from the Event:
Flexport we are innnnn!!!!
They have a nice sound tester. There is a chat!! Omg Idk what I’ll say hahaha
Okay the customs director is here. That’s great cause my title had a joke about customs.
Okay changes have begun.
Housekeeping items. Side bar on the right where you can write questions.
At the end will be a Q&A so get in questions early.
Also a tab is labeled documents
Omg this is so amazing. Never saw anything like this. They have a next-level video conference room.
They have a tariff simulator and tariff calculator!! Nailing it FLEXPORT
Okay there is a legal disclaimer.
The agenda
Oh, you’re not allowed to chat. Only react. But. You can add questions.
I love it. Hahahaha.
Oaky here we go (and their ppt is ALL in brand colors)
They’re like, okay most of us know Section 232, but incase you don’t it’s part of the Trade Expansion Act from 1962 allowing commerce department to recommend trade restrictions, tariffs, on national security ground.
It’s a 270 day timeline with investigations.
Like maybe not enough steel capacity in the USA so we need tariffs or a licensure regime or whatever it is
Recent usage begins in 2018.
There wasn’t a lot of usage of this until 2018 and then we investigated steel, aluminum, and auto parts
Auto parts would take a few years to come to fruition
Less of the small products which we call derivatives
Anything else we should see if it’s subject to 232 tariffs?
We’ve seen inclusions add to steel and aluminum but the latest update added 25 codes.
Their font is small.
Okay there are other investigations ongoing:
- passenger parts, copper, pharmaphecuticals, copper, timber, critical minerals
You can see the historical data on how long it has taken.
Semiconductor derivatives has a wide range of products
Phones, laptops, margarita machines…
Luckily the order was pretty limited
Changes for (idk what he said)
Plenty more to come here, a few investigations have aged out of the 270 day timeline
I wish they had subtitles.
What changed? What happened on Thursday and went into effect?
No more content breakouts. No more line splitting. No metal-specific codes
You used to only pay on steel or aluminum wither hte IEPA rate or section 232 rate - but the breout process is over. No more line splitting (every broker must be happy about)
No more aluminum vs steel code … all one code now.
You still need to know what the code is, but no code to keep track of of both.
Original 232 products from 218 are more metal-intensive. Industrial parts, rods, coils - these are more the 50% rate.
The products made with those things are at a 25% rate
Those are applied to the full value of the product.
The process of “this is 40% metal” has gone away
What is good overall is it is more simple to understand. Easier for importers and CVP. Easier to audit.
Also clarified that the way they’re using content - tehy’re talking about weight or value back and forth for the last year.
Really looking at weight of metal relative to the entire product
Another important to see is that several previous categories are included.
Aerosol cans used to be subject to 232 duties before, you had to figure out the metal content. Like the importer of paint, you had to figure out the medal on the pain can.
Or if you have a plastic bucket with a metal handle, what country was the metal melted? That was not easy to figure out
Now it’s not included anymore.
Much easier now
Canned beer is now excluded.
You’d see, oh a certain amount of content doesn’t need to be reported.
Threshold in things not classified in 72, 73, 74, or 76.
This is great for people importing cosmetic dispenser pumps - used to try to figure out the metal value of hte spring. That is now excluded.
ANother exclusion for motorcycle parts. Not only names we know, but things considered motorcycles: electric scooters, electric bicycles (considered motorcycles for classification case)
He speaks fast but it’s cause this is a short meeting and he’s trying to make time for Q&A. They need subtitles.
No longer is it that easy - a high threshold - if 95% of the steel/aluminium was melted and smelted n the USA. You need to have at least 95% of that value. If so, you pay less.
Like a lower 15% rate.
Another one is industrial products.
232 we want to make steel in the USA should a war break out.
Gosh. I just think of my ex-fiance (whom I still love so much and its mutual, just was hard to be together with the war. He was banned from teh USA cause of his country). He’s in Iran and we may bomb his country tonight, all their infrastructure… in like 8 hours… if things aren’t resolved. Its horrible.
It’s unreal and I want this to get resolved and them to negotiate for peace. Then I want to see him again soon.
More production for things. Subject to a 15% lower rate.
Hoping to confirm and see how Russian aluminum and 122 play togehter before IEPA and if they can be on the same line.
Finally, there were 25 new codes added to the lists here. Cast iron articles, transformers, railcars…
All snuck in there, not a lot of people talking about them.
Watching those very closely
So… all these changes have happened now, what does this mean for my business? Entry process is simpler, but my brokers took care of that anyway.
If your products are in Chapter 72 or 74, you were paying the same as before, maybe a bit more depending on how you define content.
If you are aggressive in talking about content being the pre-production, paying more. If it’s post-production, you may be paying the same.
If you do cosmetics, paint, beer, chemicals, sporting goods, you’re probably going to save on the 232 duties.
But if you products were in Headings 7301-7320, or your products are in 7601-7614, you’re probably paying more or the 50% amount of declared value.
I’ll walk through a couple of examples of how this works in practice here. And some of these middle ones get a bit funky.
So here’s an example. A metal intensive 50% list. Let’s say you have $10,000 of steel kegs and we’ll say “non-china” to keep things simple.
Wow, why? Why does non-china have such a different thing??
If you used to try to say that glazing and different things didn’t count, now you’re gonna be paying more.
Now you’re paying 50% on the full value of the keg.
Wow this is so crazy how your costs can go up so much. You know?
Wow this next chart they have is pretty cool - its all red and yellow. I’m just impressed with Flexport and how much they try to make things easy for others to understand (this chart that is red/yellow). I mean, I dont’ work in this industry but they way they just make all these tools and so many things, its cool. I feel like they’re a gold standard in business.
Lol the next one is a “bench vise” as the product they’re talking about . What is a bench vise hahaha
This will be cheaper now.
If you’d been aggressively back-outing the prices, you’ll see the same amount. But it’s hard to say how much of the steel is coming through a steel bench vise.
Under this new regime, you cap out at 25%.
You’ll probably now be paying a little bit less.
Omg they have a “lite mode” for this livestream? I wanna see what it is: Lite mode will result in a 30 second delay between the live broadcast and what you’ll see on your screen. Would you like to continue?
I turned it on. I dont notice anything. Except it did go in the past a bit. 30 seconds lag. Cool
Okay next section, what didn’t change.
Customers may see a lot of gaming if you include packaging with the weight. It may just be based on the product itself, not the packaging.
LOL you know the mention of “gaming” triggers me thinking of GameStop. LOL if the CEO is watching, he knows it too. I’d speculate.
Now its Q&A but they’ve got a survey (where I’m telling them to have subtitles next time)… but I wanna put a good answer of their question of “waht else do you want to hear about? I think: How logistics infrastructure supports emerging retail ecosystems… and/or “how are you fighting human trafficking in the cargo ship industry?”
Good. I’m glad I wrote those. And I’m serious. I wanna hear about this and if they’re fighting human trafficking. I think their CEO is a really good guy and wants to make humanity better.
Okay the Q&A is over. They’ll email everyone a link to the recording and a copy of the slides. Thanks, have a great day. Thanks for coming.
And… let me just casually put this here… my chat with claude before this event:
Until next time, I wish you the motivation and success to search for opportunities around your area. Search and explore: Who is out there giving talks? There are new things happening all of the time.
Find relatable or interesting topics you like and check them out! Maybe even something hosted at a cool venue, if there’s no other reason to go. Let’s see what you can learn and discover not too far from home. 😊
