U.S. president on Saturday agreed to not raise the tariff rate on goods imported from China, the White House announced.
President Donald Trump agreed to temporarily hold his next round of fire in the USA trade war with China in order to give Washington and Beijing more time to talk, the White House announced Saturday.
But the White House also said the existing 10 percent tariffs on $200 billion worth of Chinese goods would be lifted to 25 percent if no deal was reached within 90 days, once again setting the clock ticking.
US President Donald Trump boasted Monday that US relations with China have taken a "BIG leap forward" following his meeting in Argentina with President Xi Jinping. Furthermore, China agreed to start buying more agricultural products immediately - which presumably means scaling back some of its retaliatory tariffs, some of which had targeted Trump voters and more rural industries specifically.
While Trump and Lopez Obrador both said they had a "great" first phone call after the latter's landslide victory in July, the two were at odds over the renaming of the updated agreement, with Trump insisting on listing the United States before other countries.
The White House announced it wouldn't raise the 10 percent tariffs to 25 percent, instead giving the two countries 90 days to talk out their problems.
Asian shares were mostly lower Tuesday as traders questioned whether a 90-day truce in a tariff battle will allow the USA and China to resolve issues ranging from technology development to trade. "Farmers, I LOVE YOU!" the United States president tweeted. China gets a delay on additional tariffs, while the USA gets greater purchases of agriculture goods while retaining leverage to push for more structural changes to the economy. And the threat to slap tariffs on everything China exports to the USA will presumably be back on the table as well. The meeting will also be a test of the personal chemistry between the two leaders, which Trump has hailed as a warm friendship.
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China has aimed tariffs at industries perceived to extract the greatest impact on industries that tend to favor Trump. Chinese manufactured products account for 61.6% of the consumer electronics imported into America.
According to Chinese media the leaders have reached a consensus that trade talks should continue and have agreed not to impose any additional tariffs, at least for now.
Beijing and Washington now have 90 days to make progress in talks over the main issues, which include United States complaints that China forces American companies to hand over technology and steals their intellectual property through hacking.
The U.S. leader said U.S. farmers "will be a very BIG and FAST beneficiary of our deal with China". While China has comparatively less room to implement new tariffs as it imports significantly less than it exports to the US, China also will not increase tariffs during this period. China has retaliated with duties on some $110bn of United States goods over the same period.
In return, Beijing will purchase "very substantial" amount of agricultural, energy, industrial and other products from Washington.
"China has agreed to reduce and remove tariffs on cars coming into China from the US".
Trump noted that he will be departing for Washington, D.C. once the dinner concludes and that following his arrival, the presidential aircraft Air Force One will be reset and sent to Houston, Texas, where it will bring the remains of the late president George H.W. Bush to Washington for his state funeral.
