US President Donald Trump on Monday said his nation will impose a 100% tariff on all movies made outside the country. “Our movie making business has been stolen from the United States of America, by other
Countries, just like stealing ‘candy from a baby’,” he said in a social media post on Truth Social, a social media platform he owns.
A report by Reuters said that Trump had threatened to impose such levies earlier in May but offered few details, leading to confusion among entertainment industry executives.
The United States contributes nearly 35 to 40 percent of the overseas box office for Indian films, making it the single most important foreign market for Bollywood and regional cinema alike.
Industry analysts warn that ticket prices and distribution costs could double if the new rules are fully enforced, pushing many Indian film releases into the unviable category. Smaller and mid-budget productions are seen as the most vulnerable, with their margins already razor thin.
For the Indian diaspora in the U.S., estimated at over 5.2 million, this could mean sharply reduced access to theatres and significantly higher ticket costs.
As a result, the shift to OTT platforms is expected to accelerate, with audiences increasingly choosing streaming over theatrical viewing.
It remains unclear how tariffs on the film industry would work. Back in May, when the US President first threatened tariffs on the industry, he did not say whether he planned to apply them to streaming platforms as well as theatrical releases.
It was also not specified if the tariffs would be based on production costs or box office revenue. The Guardian, in a report published on May, also said that it remained unclear whether productions split between the US and other countries would be exempt.
