TORONTO — Roughly $900 billion in annual trade between Canada and the United States — and with it, traditionally chummy bilateral ties — is on the brink of upheaval, with President Donald Trump threatening to impose sweeping tariffs on Canada as early as this weekend.

U.S. President Donald Trump has pledged to place 25% tariffs on imports from Mexico and Canada from Feb. 1 if the two countries are not judged to be doing enough to stop the flow of fentanyl into the United States.

President Donald Trump’s nominee for commerce secretary, billionaire financial-services executive Howard Lutnick, made an effort Wednesday to ease concerns about potentially inflationary 25% tariffs against Canada and Mexico that could hit Saturday.

The Bank of Canada on Wednesday trimmed its key policy rate by 25 basis points to 3%, cut growth forecasts and warned Canadians that a tariff war triggered by the United States could cause major economic damage.

OTTAWA — The potential for U.S. tariffs is clouding the economic outlook for the Bank of Canada as it delivered another interest rate cut, reducing its policy rate by a quarter-percentage point to three per cent.