Trump’s administration is poised to impose new sectoral tariffs that will impact China, including on semiconductors, pharmaceuticals, ship-to-shore cranes and other products.
“We’re very close to a deal with China. We really sort of made a deal with China, but we’ll see how that goes,” Trump told reporters before his meeting with von der Leyen, providing no further details.
DEEPER ISSUES
Previous US-China trade talks in Geneva and London in May and June focused on bringing US and Chinese retaliatory tariffs down from triple-digit levels and restoring the flow of rare earth minerals halted by China and Nvidia’s H20 AI chips and other goods halted by the United States.
So far, the talks have not delved into broader economic issues. They include US complaints that China’s state-led, export-driven model is flooding world markets with cheap goods, and Beijing’s complaints that US national security export controls on tech goods seek to stunt Chinese growth.
“Stockholm will be the first meaningful round of US-China trade talks,” said Bo Zhengyuan, Shanghai-based partner at China consultancy firm Plenum.
Trump has been successful in pressuring some other trading partners, including Japan, Vietnam and the Philippines, into deals accepting higher US tariffs of 15 per cent to 20 per cent.
Analysts say the US-China negotiations are far more complex and will require more time. China’s grip on the global market for rare earth minerals and magnets, used in everything from military hardware to car windshield wiper motors, has proved to be an effective leverage point on US industries.
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