The People’s Republic of iPhone

Donald Trump has threatened to impose a 25 per cent tariff on what is arguably the world’s most successful consumer product, the iPhone .

Apple currently sells around 70 million iPhones in the US for about $1,000 each.

But what Trump wants is actually more extreme: he believes that in order to escape his punitive tariff, Apple might bring production of the iPhone back to America .

Patrick McGee : The World ’s most influential technology company must avoid picking a side and to what extent it already has.

He says Apple must appease Xi Jinping or lose access to the world’s largest group of consumers.

In 2016 , Cook and two of his top executives visited the headquarters of the Chinese Communist Party , where they promised to invest $ 275bn in the country over the following five years .