China is the largest producer of LED displays, and more than 90% of LED displays and LED module accessories come from China. Therefore, the impact and losses of the US tariffs on Chinese companies are huge, especially for LED display companies that rely on the US as their main market.

Let’s talk about this topic from three aspects: consumption, sales and imports:

Impact on terminal consumption

Price increases suppress consumer demand
US tariffs have led to a significant increase in the cost of LED display screens exported from China, and the price of terminal products has generally doubled
LED display project cycle extension and adjustment of cooperative factories.
In order to avoid tariffs, US importers may turn to merchants in non-tariff-affected regions such as Canada and Paraguay, but the running-in period of the new supply chain may lead to longer delivery cycles and insufficient technical support. Large projects (such as sports stadium LED displays and municipal outdoor LED display projects) may re-evaluate their budgets due to increased costs, affecting the overall market growth.

Impact on imports

The United States is the third largest export market for China’s LED display screens (accounting for 11%-14% of overseas exports). The high tariffs on normal imports directly weaken price competitiveness and significantly compress profit margins, which may induce more importers to use gray customs clearance and falsely report the value of LED display products to achieve the cost and price advantage of reducing products.

Impact on the sales market

Limited benefits to US domestic brands
The US domestic LED display manufacturing capacity is weak, and it is difficult to fill the gap in Chinese products in the short term, which may lead to tight market supply. Although brands such as Daktronics have certain production capacity, their production capacity and cost disadvantages limit the space for substitution
Intensified competition in emerging markets and rising domestic demand
Chinese companies are accelerating their expansion into markets such as South America, Europe, the Middle East, and Southeast Asia. Top Shine has a large number of indoor P2.5, outdoor P5 LED displays and modules, and P3.91 rental LED displays in stock at its LED display warehouse in Brazil. At the same time, domestic government projects, smart cities, and new infrastructure projects have brought a large number of orders for traffic LED displays, outdoor digital signs, and indoor LED Screens.

The impact of the US tariff increase on the LED display industry is characterized by “short-term impact and long-term differentiation”

In the future, the LED display industry needs to respond to challenges through technological innovation (such as the integration of colorful LED lamps and drivers, Mini/Micro and COB LED screen), market diversification (deepening the “Belt and Road” and domestic demand markets) and supply chain resilience construction (overseas production capacity + local core advantages). At the same time, transparent crystal film LED screens and bus-mounted LED screens will become the key breakthrough points of Top Shine LED.