Britain this morning became the latest nation forced to take a dose of Donald Trump’s economic ‘medicine’ as the FTSE 100 tanked on opening to its lowest level in a year.

Amid massive hits to Asian markets overnight London followed suit this morning in the wake of the US president’s decision to levy import taxes on friends and foes alike last week.  

The FTSE 100 is down 5 per cent in trading today, having seen its worst day since the pandemic on Friday. 

Manufacturers with high exposure to the US market like Airbus and Rolls-Royce, and banks, were among those worse hit.

And there were worse falls in Europe, with Germany’s Dax down 10 per cent and the pan-European STOXX 600 slumping 5.8 per cent.

Despite increasingly alarmed warnings, including from allies in the United States, Trump has likened his move to an unpleasant cure for illness. 

‘Sometimes you have to take medicine to fix something,’ he told reporters on Air Force One last night. 

He denied he was intentionally engineering a market selloff and insisted he could not foresee market reactions, saying he would not make a deal with other countries unless trade deficits were solved.

Later he posted on his Truth Social platform that the tariffs were ‘a beautiful thing to behold’. 

Meanwhile in the UK, Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander said global tariffs are ‘bad news’ when asked if the world was heading towards a global recession.

Gas guzzling supercars are set to be exempted from the 2030 ban on new petrol vehicles as ministers scramble to help companies hit by the tariff war. 

Ms Alexander said PM Sir Keir Starmer has ‘built a relationship’ with Trump and will be ‘honest’ with the UK’s allies about the impacts of tariffs on the national and global economy.

Speaking on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, she said: ‘So you’re right to say that the Prime Minister has built a relationship with President Trump.

‘I think that has been obvious over the last couple of months.

‘We’re clear that, actually, a constantly escalating trade war where tariffs are ratcheted up is bad for global demand.

‘It’s bad for prices, which means it’s bad for British consumers and so, obviously, when the Prime Minister has discussions internationally with allies, he will be honest about both what is in the best interests of the British people, and actually the sort of global impacts of the global tariffs will have a knock-on impact upon our economy.’

Sir Keir has been speaking with Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney and French President Emmanuel Macron over the last few days regarding how best to ‘navigate’ the current economic climate, she added.

The S&P 500, Nasdaq, and Dow — the three main U.S. stock market indices — are on course to open Monday morning down as much as 6 percent. Analysts fear last week’s $6.6 trillion wipeout was just the beginning.

In early Monday morning trading in Asia — Sunday night US time – Japan’s Nikkei cratered as much as 8 percent. Australia was down 6 per cent, South Korea 5 per cent, Taiwan almost 10 percent, Singapore 8.5 percent, Hong Kong 10 per cent and China almost 5 percent.

CNBC host and market analyst Jim Cramer warned that the US could be barreling toward another Black Monday.

The 1987 crash — a 22.6 percent drop in a single day — remains the worst in modern market history, far eclipsing the chaos of 2008 or even the Covid crash.

‘If the president doesn’t reach out and reward countries and companies that follow the rules, then the 1987 scenario… where we dropped for three days and then plunged 22 percent on Monday, becomes highly relevant,’ Cramer said during his show on Saturday.

Trump ally Bill Ackman has warned that the world is on the brink of an ‘economic nuclear winter’ as he begged the president to hit pause on his reciprocal tariffs.

The Pershing Square Capital Management CEO warned that Trump’s current trajectory could devastate businesses around the world. 

‘The country is 100 percent behind the president on fixing a global system of tariffs that has disadvantaged the country. But business is a confidence game and confidence depends on trust,’ he wrote.

‘By placing massive and disproportionate tariffs on our friends and our enemies alike and thereby launching a global economic war against the whole world at once, we are in the process of destroying confidence in our country as a trading partner, as a place to do business and as a market to invest capital.’

He then said Trump ‘has an opportunity to call a 90-day timeout, negotiate and resolve unfair asymmetric tariff deals and induce trillions of dollars of new investment in our country.

‘If, on the other hand, on April 9th, we launch economic nuclear war on every country in the world, business investment will grind to a halt, consumers will close their wallets and pocket books and we will severely damage our reputation with the rest of the world that will take years and potentially decades to rehabilitate.’