US President Donald Trump said he would likely speak to Chinese leader Xi Jinping later this week following talks between Washington and Beijing to temporarily lower tariffs and de-escalate the trade war between the world’s two largest economies.
“I’ll speak to President Xi, maybe at the end of the week,” Trump said at the White House on Monday.
The tariff arrangement, agreed to after talks in Switzerland between Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer with a Chinese delegation, will see the combined 145% US levies on most Chinese imports reduced to 30% — including the rate tied to fentanyl by May 14 — while the 125% Chinese duties on US goods will drop to 10%.
The three-month lowering of import duties will give the countries time to negotiate a broader agreement on trade. The tariff reductions won’t apply to sectoral duties applied to all US trading partners or to tariffs applied on China during the first Trump administration.
Trump also claimed that China had agreed to “suspend and remove all of its non-monetary barriers.”
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“They’ve agreed to open China, fully open China. And I think it’s going to be fantastic for China. I think it’s going to be fantastic for us, and I think it’s going to be great for unification and peace,” Trump said.
Trump said tariffs could go above the 30% level if talks over the next 90 days failed to secure an agreement, noting that they could be “substantially higher.” But he added that the US would not raise the combined China tariff back to the 145% levies.
The trade-talk developments saw Wall Street power ahead after solid gains in Asia and Europe, with the S&P 500 jumping about 2.5% to trade above President Donald Trump’s April 2 “Liberation Day” shock. Equities big and small advanced while a surge in big tech drove the Nasdaq 100 toward a bull market. The dollar rose almost 1%.
Earlier: US, China to Slash Tariffs During 90-Day Reprieve for Talks
Trump cast the moves as reassuring for businesses, saying he had already spoken to Apple Inc.’s Tim Cook earlier this morning and that the tech CEO was raising the company’s investments in the US.
Trump in April unveiled sweeping tariffs on dozens of countries, part of a bid to bring more manufacturing jobs to the US and more revenue for the federal government. But he quickly paused those import taxes to allow trading partners a 90-day window to negotiate deals. Last week, he touted the first of those agreements — with the UK — though the deal fell short of the “comprehensive” pact Trump claimed with many details left to further negotiations.
Investors, though, had been eager for negotiations between the US and China, and any sign the countries would find an off-ramp to ease their trade fight. While the latest developments have buoyed markets, history suggests it could take a long time for the US and China to reach a detailed agreement.
“The talks in Geneva were very friendly, the relationship is very good,” Trump said Monday. “We’re not looking to hurt China. China was being hurt very badly.”
The de-escalation comes after recent data showed a slump in trade across the Pacific Ocean, fueling worries that Trump’s broad tariff agenda could hit American consumers with higher prices and fewer choices and pitch the global economy into a downturn.
