The 100% Tariff That Never Arrived
India spent September preparing for a tariff that would have applied to every Indian good entering the United States, not just the ones containing Russian inputs. Under Section 113 of the Lindsey O. Graham Sanctioning Russia and Iran Act, goods from the five largest importers of Russian crude or gas were to carry an additional 100% ad valorem duty. India is one of those five.
On Friday, October 16, President Trump signed an executive order that set the rate at 100% and then waived it under Section 115(a) of the same Act, after certifying to Congress that the waiver was in the national interest. The duties remain written into the order — they are suspended, not repealed, and remain suspended only until the president or the secretary of state decides otherwise.
Two details matter more than the headline:
- The trigger is prospective. Section 2(b) of the order applies the 100% only where a country "knowingly makes new purchases of crude oil or natural gas that originated in the Russian Federation on or after October 18, 2026." Cargoes bought before that date do not count. The waiver makes the point moot for now, but it is the clause that decides what happens if the waiver falls.
- It is a waiver with a review date. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Saturday that Trump would revisit the decision in 60 days — putting the next decision point around mid-December, weeks after the midterms and roughly when the India-US bilateral trade agreement is meant to be signed.
Rubio was explicit about the linkage on Monday, speaking in Uzbekistan: "We are trying to finalise a trade deal with India right now and we are very close to doing that. So, that's one of the things we take into consideration when the President makes a decision about national security waivers." Michael Kugelman of the Atlantic Council called the pause "the confidence-building measure that gives the two sides the negotiating space to get over the final hump."
The Indian government had warned in September that the new tariff measures could hurt bilateral ties. The energy arithmetic behind that warning is straightforward: India is the world's third-largest oil importer and consumer, Russia accounted for nearly half of India's oil imports earlier this year, and purchases have been falling since August as refiners tried to stay ahead of the statute.
| Stock | Impact | Reason | Confidence |
|---|---|---|---|
| IOC, BPCL, HINDPETRO, MRPL | 🟢 Positive | ⚠️ inferred. These are the state refiners that carry the Russian crude slate. The waiver removes a 100% duty on their entire export book as the price of buying discounted crude, which restores the optionality that made Russian barrels attractive in the first place | 3/5 |
| RELIANCE | 🟢 Positive | ⚠️ inferred. The Jamnagar complex is the largest single-site refinery in the world and the most flexible buyer in the system; the tariff risk that had been attached to its feedstock choice is now a policy variable rather than a cost | 3/5 |
| ONGC, OIL | 🟡 Watch | ⚠️ inferred. Upstream realisations depend on the crude marker, which fell about 1.4% on the waiver. India's producers benefit from a high Brent, so a de-escalation in the supply premium works against them even as it helps the refiners | 2/5 |
| GAIL, PETRONET | 🟡 Watch | ⚠️ inferred. Neither is directly named in the Graham Act, but both price off the same energy complex and both re-rate on any structural improvement in India-US energy cooperation | 2/5 |
Rubio Lands in Mumbai Tomorrow, and the Deal Is One Signature Away
The Secretary of State arrives in India on Tuesday, October 20 for a two-day visit that includes a meeting with External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar on trade, energy, investment and defence, and stops in Mumbai and Jamnagar. The State Department's own framing is "enhanced energy cooperation" and meetings with business leaders on commercial investment.
Jamnagar is not a diplomatic courtesy stop. It is Reliance's refining complex, roughly 1.4 million barrels per day of capacity, and it is the physical asset that makes India a swing buyer of crude in a market where the US is trying to control who buys Russian barrels.
The trade file Rubio is arriving to close has been in legal drafting since mid-October. Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal said on October 15 that the first tranche of the India-US bilateral trade agreement has been finalised and is going through "the final contours, the legal drafting", to be operationalised once India has a "comparable advantage or competitive advantage over our peer countries" — the reference being Bangladesh, Vietnam and Indonesia. Wheat, rice, maize and soymeal remain excluded, as do sensitive dairy lines.
The one thing the waiver does not touch is the Section 301 excess-capacity investigation into India, which Washington has not yet completed and which New Delhi has repeatedly identified as the binding constraint on timing. India joined the US-led structural overcapacity initiative earlier this month, which helps politically but does not close the case.
| Stock | Impact | Reason | Confidence |
|---|---|---|---|
| RELIANCE | 🟢 Positive | ✅ named geography. A US secretary of state visiting the refining complex is the strongest available signal that India's refining feedstock choice will not be priced as a sanctions violation while the waiver holds | 3/5 |
| GESHIP | 🟡 Watch | ⚠️ inferred. Crude and product voyages between Russian ports and Indian refiners are the revenue line that a Section 113 tariff would have destroyed; the waiver keeps the trade legal, but freight rates are set by the volume, not the permission | 2/5 |
| LT, THERMAX-type energy EPC | 🟡 Watch | ⚠️ inferred. "Enhanced energy cooperation" is the phrase that precedes LNG and refining capex announcements, but no project, no value and no counterparty has been named | 2/5 |
| SUNPHARMA, DRREDDY, CIPLA, LUPIN | 🟢 Positive | ⚠️ inferred. The US is the largest market for all four, and a 100% secondary tariff on all Indian goods was the single largest unhedged risk in their US revenue line | 3/5 |
The Export Basket Has Its Tail Risk Back, Not a New Advantage
The correction that matters for exporters is a correction of a probability, not a change in the tariff schedule. India's existing US duties — the 10% Section 301 forced-labour tier plus product-specific measures — are untouched by Friday's order. What has gone is the scenario in which every Indian shipment faced an additional 100% because of where the crude came from.
That is worth separating from the two files that are still live:
- US anti-dumping and countervailing duty finals on crystalline silicon solar cells from India, Indonesia and Laos. Commerce's preliminary dumping margin on India was 123.04%, and final duty orders are scheduled for October 26, 2026. Nothing in the Graham Act waiver touches this.
- Section 232 and Section 301 product coverage, which continues to expand by product line rather than by country.
So the correct read of Monday is asymmetric: the downside scenario for the whole export basket narrowed, while the specific sector-level risks that were already in the price stayed exactly where they were.
| Stock | Impact | Reason | Confidence |
|---|---|---|---|
| WELSPUNLIV, TRIDENT, KPRMILL, PAGEIND | 🟢 Positive | ⚠️ inferred. Home textiles and apparel carry the highest tariff-per-rupee exposure of any Indian export category into the US; the removal of a 100% scenario is worth more to them than to any other listed basket | 3/5 |
| MOTHERSON, BHARATFORG | 🟢 Positive | ⚠️ inferred. Auto components shipped to US OEMs sat inside the same secondary-tariff perimeter; the waiver protects the landed cost of the parent vehicle programmes | 2/5 |
| DIXON | 🟡 Watch | ⚠️ inferred. Electronics assembly is the category most exposed to US tariff design, but Dixon's revenue is overwhelmingly domestic; the read-across is sentiment, not order flow | 2/5 |
| WAAREEENER, PREMIERENE, VIKRAMSOLR | 🔴 Negative | ⚠️ inferred. These are the listed Indian solar manufacturers with US cell and module exposure, and they face the one duty that is not waived: the AD/CVD finals on October 26, with a 123.04% preliminary Indian margin | 3/5 |
The Rupee's Seventh Straight Gain Is Doing Half the Work
The currency has become the quiet policy instrument of this rally. The rupee strengthened for a seventh consecutive session on Monday, touching 94.80 in early trade before settling near 94.95 — extending Friday's close of 94.96 and a weekly gain of about 1.9%, the strongest in seven months. That move came after the RBI's October package of forex-derivative curbs, a dollar window for the oil marketing companies and a 20% risk reserve requirement, and it has run alongside persistent foreign selling.
For importers, a stronger rupee is a direct margin input. For exporters — the same basket the waiver just helped — it is a partial offset, which is why the export read should not be treated as linear.
| Stock | Impact | Reason | Confidence |
|---|---|---|---|
| HDFCBANK, ICICIBANK, SBIN, KOTAKBANK | 🟡 Watch | ⚠️ inferred. A stable rupee reduces the mark-to-market and provisioning noise on unhedged corporate books, but Monday showed that in this market earnings quality is deciding bank prices, not the currency: Axis Bank fell 4.19% on a 39.4% profit rise | 2/5 |
| INDIGO | 🟢 Positive | ⚠️ inferred. Fuel is dollar-denominated and the airline's cost base is the most currency-sensitive in the listed consumer complex; a stronger rupee plus softer crude is a double input-cost relief | 3/5 |
| IOC, BPCL, HINDPETRO | 🟢 Positive | ⚠️ inferred. Working capital and import bills are dollar-funded, so a 2% rupee recovery is a genuine reduction in the cost of the crude the waiver just made easier to buy | 3/5 |
The honest summary: India got its tail risk removed, not a trade deal. The deal is being drafted, the Secretary of State arrives tomorrow, and the 60-day clock on the waiver runs out around mid-December — which is now the date that matters more than any tariff line in the statute.