Edgar Cervantes / Android Authority
TL;DR
- Sweeping tariffs have brought widespread confusion to international markets, and businesses everywhere are bracing for price hikes.
- US carrier execs have recently spoken out about the potential impact tariffs could have on smartphone sales.
- Both Verizon and AT&T have expressed plans to pass tariff-associated costs along to end consumers.
The current US administration’s chaotic love affair with tariffs is still wreaking havoc upon global markets, and it feels like no corner of the economy has been safe from the fallout. Smartphones have found themselves on and off the hook as the White House has struggled to make up its mind about what it actually wants to do here, and while the jury’s still out on what form this mess is ultimately going to take, a lot of companies are already bracing themselves for fallout. That includes your cellular carrier, and while you may not like the strategy they’re preparing for, none of us should be surprised.
For a whole, whole lot of Americans, your cellular provider isn’t just the company you pay every month for wireless service, but also where you go to buy your phone. Those businesses are thinking about how tariffs could impact your next upgrade, and so far it looks like they all intend to pass any price increase right along to you.
Bloomberg reports that Verizon CEO Hans Vestberg stated earlier this week that the carrier “will not cover any enormous increase on tariffs on handsets. That’s ultimately going to hit the consumer in the market.” That’s a sentiment repeated by AT&T CEO John Stankey, confirming a strategy of “taking that cost as we’ve traditionally done and largely moving it through to the end user.”
T-Mobile, perhaps to its credit, has not made any nearly so direct statement about passing costs along, and execs have even recognized the fear and uncertainty consumers are feeling right now. That said, business is business, and it’s hard to imagine a world in which one of the big carriers goes to extremes in a way that allows it to seriously undercut its peers when it comes to phone hardware.
Then again, this entire tariff nightmare has been a little hard to imagine in the first place, so — guess we’ll see!
