A cease-fire approved to bridge differences
Presidents Donald Trump and Xi Jinping again have hit the reset button in trade talks between the world’s two biggest economies, at least delaying an escalation in tension between the U.S. and China that had financial markets on edge and cast a cloud over the global economy.
But when U.S. and Chinese negotiators sit down to work out details, the same difficult task remains: getting China to convince the United States that it will curb its aggressive push to challenge American technological dominance — and then to live up to its promises.
At the Group of 20 meeting in Osaka, Japan, Trump and Xi agreed to a cease-fire in the trade conflict. Trump said Saturday he would hold off for the “time being” on plans to impose tariffs on $300 billion more in Chinese imports — on top of the $250 billion he already has targeted. This decision will jump-start trade talks that stalled in May.
“We’re going to work with China where we left off,” Trump said Saturday. He also said China had agreed to buy more American farm products.
Andy Rothman, an investment strategist with Matthews Asia and a former economic official with the U.S. Embassy in Beijing, said the Trump-Xi meeting was more conciliatory than he expected. He was struck by Trump’s use of the term “strategic partner” to describe U.S. relations with China after other administration officials have played up the geopolitical rivalry between the two countries.
Addressing another contentious issue, Trump said he now will allow U.S. companies to sell some components to Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei, which last month was put on an American blacklist as a threat to national security. Trump said that Huawei will stay on the blacklist, however, and that its future won’t be decided until the end of the trade talks.
Neil Shearing, London-based chief economist at Capital Economics, predicted that financial markets will rally with relief when they reopen Monday. “But I don’t think this marks the turning of the tide,” he said. “Talks will ebb and flow, but the direction over the next 12 months will be toward renewed escalation because issues around industrial strategy will prove to be so intractable.”
The Trump administration says China is trying to cheat its way to dominance.
In a report last year, the Office of the United States Trade Representative accused Beijing of resorting to predatory tactics to challenge American technological supremacy.
These include forcing foreign companies to hand over technology in exchange for access to the Chinese market; subsidizing its own companies (especially those owned by the state) while burying foreign companies in regulations; providing government money so Chinese companies can buy sensitive foreign technology at abovemarket prices; and stealing trade secrets outright.
Eleven rounds of talks failed to end the standoff. The United States has imposed 25% import taxes on $250 billion in Chinese products and threatened to target $300 billion more — a move that would extend the tariffs to virtually everything China ships to the United States.
China has lashed back with tariffs on $110 billion in American goods, focusing on agricultural products in a direct and painful shot at Trump supporters in the U.S. farm belt.
The last time that Trump and Xi met — in early December at a G-20 gathering in Buenos Aires, Argentina — they also reached a cease-fire that injected new life into the talks.
But the momentum from that meeting didn’t last.