Tariff barriers keep climbing, USD still dominates trade

Canada's new tariffs on Chinese exports won't have much of an impact on China's economy, but they are symptomatic of a broader wave of protectionist measures that have been ramping up in recent years. And while the share of China's cross-border transactions settled in renminbi has risen sharply, this largely reflects increasing portfolio flows between the mainland and Hong Kong, rather than a significant expansion of the renminbi's use in global trade.