Temu stops shipments from China as Trump axes trade loophole

Temu on Friday said it has stopped shipments of cheap goods from China to the US as President Trump axed a trade loophole that allowed the fast-fashion giant to sidestep tariffs and customs checks.

Its US website has shifted to offer only what it calls “local” items – or products that were shipped overseas in bulk and stored in US warehouses in a mad dash to beat Trump’s tariffs.

“All sales in the US are now handled by locally based sellers, with orders fulfilled from within the country,” a Temu spokesperson told The Post in a statement.

The end of the de minimis exemption is a massive blow to Temu, which is owned by China-based PDD Holdings, and rival Shein, both of which used the loophole to send packages worth less than $800 into the US duty-free.

As the two Chinese e-commerce giants have exploded in popularity, thanks to their cheap, speedy deliveries of $5 shirts and $10 dresses, so has usage of the de minimis rule.

A massive 1.36 billion shipments made their way into the US under the exemption in 2024, up from 637 million just four years earlier, according to US Customs and Border Protection.

But Trump ended the exemption for goods made in China and Hong Kong after midnight on Friday.

Temu had been gradually preparing for the tariff crunch, last week placing “local” goods at the top of the page for US customers and announcing plans to raise prices. 

It also started slapping products from overseas with specific “import charges.”

Along with facing new tariffs and a hefty 145% rate on China, Temu and Shein packages would have to go through customs without the exemption, which could lead to delayed shipments.

Customs officials would need to randomly search an additional 1 million packages per day – the amount of items that the two companies sent to the US daily, according to The Wall Street Journal.

About a year ago, as it prepared for the loophole to end, Temu started recruiting US sellers who were importing their own inventory from China, according to the Journal.

Temu is still actively recruiting these US sellers, a spokesperson told The Post.

Temu’s products were 20% to 30% cheaper than those sold by US competitors like Amazon – but the site is set to lose much of that price advantage, especially as its stockpile in the US dwindles.