Stock markets mostly rose Tuesday with traders’ attention fixed on President-elect Donald Trump’s tariff plans, earnings updates and upcoming inflation data.A report suggesting Trump could slowly hike import tariffs provided support and put a cap on the dollar’s latest surge.However, traders remain concerned that his pledges to cut taxes, regulations and immigration continue to dampen sentiment with warnings that the measures will revive inflation.Traders have slashed their expectations on how many times the Federal Reserve will cut interest rates through 2025 to one.But some fear the Fed’s next move could even be a rate hike owing to still-sticky inflation and concerns over Trump’s policies.Data on Tuesday showed US wholesale inflation for December was lower than expected, with no change in the Producer Price Index over the month when volatile food and energy prices are excluded. Wall Street’s three main indexes all opened higher.Investors will be paying more attention to US and UK consumer price inflation data due on Wednesday.”With rate expectations now the driving force behind market moves, key inflation data midweek will continue to shape the narrative for the early parts of 2025,” noted Matt Britzman, senior equity analyst at Hargreaves Lansdown.European stock markets were mostly higher in afternoon trading.In Asia, Hong Kong and Shanghai rallied as China’s securities regulator said it was looking at ways to provide more stability to markets.This followed another run of poor performances sparked by worries over the world number two economy and Trump’s threatened tariffs.- Dollar mixed -The dollar traded mixed against major peers Tuesday after Bloomberg reported that members of Trump’s team were looking at a gradual increase in tariffs to boost their negotiating hand and tamper inflationary pressures.Traders were spooked when he said soon after his re-election that he would impose huge levies on China, Canada and Mexico as soon as he took office.The pound remained stuck close to levels not seen since the end of 2023. The euro was near its weakest since late 2022, with fears it could return to parity with the dollar.The yen edged up against the greenback as the yield of Japan’s 40-year government bond hit its highest since being launched in 2007, with debate returning to whether the country’s central bank will hike interest rates at next week’s policy meeting.Eyes were also on earnings. In London, shares in retailer JD Sports slumped 7.3 percent after it warned on profits. Energy giant BP shed 2.1 percent on a weak trading update, capping gains on the benchmark FTSE 100 index.On the upside, Paris was lifted by rising share prices of French banks. “This earnings season will set the tone for financial stocks in 2025, but the stakes are high,” said Charu Chanana, chief investment strategist at Saxo Markets.”Even with solid fourth-quarter results, the macro backdrop — characterised by lingering inflation concerns, steeper yields, and recalibrated Fed expectations — may weigh on sentiment.”- Key figures around 1430 GMT -New York – Dow: UP 0.4 percent at 42,473.55 pointsNew York – S&P: UP 0.5 percent at 5,863.70New York – Nasdaq Composite: UP 0.7 percent at 19,212.80London – FTSE 100: UP less than 0.1 percent at 8,218.15Paris – CAC 40: UP 0.7 percent at 7,463.15Frankfurt – DAX: UP 0.8 percent at 20,297.87Tokyo – Nikkei 225: DOWN 1.8 percent at 38,474.30 (close)Hong Kong – Hang Seng Index: UP 1.8 percent at 19,219.78 (close)Shanghai – Composite: UP 2.5 percent at 3,240.94 (close)Euro/dollar: UP at $1.0267 from $1.0224 on MondayPound/dollar: DOWN at $1.2158 from $1.2180Dollar/yen: UP at 157.79 yen from 157.65 yenEuro/pound: UP at 84.44 pence from 83.90 penceWest Texas Intermediate: DOWN 0.7 percent at $76.78 per barrelBrent North Sea Crude: DOWN 0.7 percent at $80.42 per barrelburs-rl/lth

Furious at the prospect of a US government ban on social media platform TikTok, American users have flocked to another Chinese-owned app in droves, many with a defiant message: “Take my data!”TikTok has become another battleground showcasing China-US tensions, with President Joe Biden’s administration accusing the app of allowing Beijing to collect data and spy on users — claims denied by China and TikTok’s owner ByteDance. The United States passed a law last year forcing ByteDance to either sell the platform or shut it down by January 19.With that deadline looming, Xiaohongshu — a lifestyle-focussed Instagram-meets-Pinterest alternative — surged to the top of the Apple App Store downloads on Monday.The hashtag “tiktokrefugee” had more than 100 million views by Tuesday evening.”They are trying to ban TikTok because they said China is stealing information. They don’t ban any American company from stealing our information,” user penguinpepperpia, who has more than 264,000 TikTok followers, told AFP.  The content creator downloaded Xiaohongshu rather than return to US platforms such as Meta’s Instagram and Facebook, which they characterised as apps for “older people” that also “steal your personal information and sell it to other companies”. “That is why many Americans don’t care anymore and we would rather let China have our information,” said the user.Other “refugees” shared similar sentiments.New Xiaohongshu user Adham said in a video posted on Monday: “I know our government is a little bit racist, but Chinese people, I love you guys. I don’t care if you take my data. Take it.”- ‘Deliciously ironical’ –  The phenomenon showed how “foolish” the TikTok ban was, Milton Mueller, a professor at the Georgia Tech School of Public Policy who filed a brief in opposition of the ban to the US Supreme Court, told AFP. “It is deliciously ironical that the threat of a ban is backfiring so quickly, even before it is put into place,” he said.”It does seem as if the TikTok ban is pushing users towards other apps that have a much less clear division between the Chinese Communist Party and the app itself,” Duke University’s Robyn Caplan said.Neither Xiaohongshu or ByteDance commented on the situation when asked.What the phenomenon showed was that the Biden administration’s strategy towards Chinese technology of “small yard, high fence” was not effective, said the London School of Economic’s Meng Bingchun. “The yard keeps getting bigger, and the fence is leaky,” Meng said.”Worse still, in this case, those living within the fence can be migratory in the digital space.”- Short-term reaction? -Until Monday, Xiaohongshu — or RedNote in English — was popular primarily among Chinese-speaking users. It boasted 300 million monthly active users at the end of 2023. Unlike TikTok’s sister app Douyin or the micro-blogging site Weibo, Xiaohongshu skews heavily towards lifestyle content.It is seen as facing relatively less censorship than other platforms: users can be found posting LGBTQ content and discussing the merits of women remaining single, topics often considered sensitive in China.For “native” Xiaohongshu users on Monday, the influx of Americans was a head-scratcher but also provided an unexpected opportunity for cultural exchange.Some even asked for help with English homework.In public group chats on the platform, new users asked for translations of slang terms, as well as keywords to search for content they wanted.”It’s funny and ironic that the Americans and the Chinese are meeting online under the circumstance that the US government is banning TikTok… similar to what the Chinese government has been doing for ages to American apps,” 26-year-old Amanda Zhang told AFP. The part-time pet content creator, who studies in the United States, said she was worried the US government might move to ban Xiaohongshu too if it gained enough traction.It remains unclear what the long-term implications of the shift will be. Xiaohongshu’s main challenge to retaining these new users is translation, Caplan said. LSE’s Meng added: “My hunch is that what we are witnessing now is more of a short-term reaction than a long-term trend.”The question now is whether there will be a critical mass of these refugees to achieve the desired network effect for the platform, and whether Xiaohongshu will respond quickly enough to harness the new users.”