Badger Hair and iPhones: Where US-China Decoupling Is Hardest

(Bloomberg) — China will be a hard habit to kick even for a US president seemingly bent on obliterating all of its imports.

After decades of trade integration, Chinese companies have become increasingly essential suppliers of goods and materials that range from niche to ones many Americans can barely do without.

At $41 billion last year, smartphones — largely consisting of Apple’s iPhones — were the single largest US import from China. More than 70% of all smartphone imports are from China, according to Bloomberg analysis of 2024 trade data from the US International Trade Commission. 

Farther afield, China supplies the entirety of hair from badgers and other animals imported into the US for brush-making. It also delivers almost 90% of the gaming consoles US consumers buy from overseas.

Disentangling the relationship will be a tall order even after President Donald Trump imposed tariffs of 104% on all imports from China in just the past two months. 

His stated aim is to rebalance global trade and bring manufacturing back to the US — reversing decades of offshoring by American and global firms that have built up complex supply chains that go through China and many other Asian nations.

But a near-total dependence on some goods manufactured in China means many consumers and businesses are heading for a painful reckoning. 

Over 99% of the electric toasters, heated blankets, calcium, and alarm clocks the US imports are from China. Ditto for more than 90% of folding umbrellas, vacuum flasks, artificial flowers, LED lamps, and wooden coat-hangers.

The stakes are especially high when it comes to China’s dominance over the supply of critical minerals and metals, with Beijing increasingly using its control over production and processing as a geopolitical tool. 

Chinese firms supplied almost 80% of scandium and yttrium last year. Those exports were restricted by Beijing last week.

A possible next step is to ban their shipments to the US, as China did for other metals last year. 

©2025 Bloomberg L.P.