“This isn’t a trade agreement. It’s not even a breakthrough. It’s a moment of pause, a step away from escalation, not a step forward on substance,” Myron Brilliant, from advisory firm Albright Stonebridge Group and a former executive at the US Chamber of Commerce, wrote in an online analysis.
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“We still don’t know what was discussed behind closed doors in London. No clarity on export controls. No movement on tariffs. No sign of concrete deliverables.
“If there was a deal, we haven’t seen the details.”
After the talks in London, US and Chinese negotiators emerged with an agreement to return to the trade truce they had reached in Geneva last month, which rolled back triple-digit tariffs for 90 days and other retaliatory trade curbs while the parties attempted to broker a longer-term deal.
But it quickly began to unravel when the US accused China of strangling the supply of rare earths and magnets, and Washington retaliated with new curbs on chip design software, jet engine parts, and student visa restrictions, as well as export controls on ethane shipments.
Earlier, Trump used his social media platform to offer some of the first details to emerge from two days of marathon talks in London.
Chinese President Xi Jinping.Credit: AP
“Our deal with China is done, subject to final approval with President Xi [Jinping] and me,” Trump said on Truth Social.
“Full magnets, and any necessary rare earths, will be supplied, up front, by China. Likewise, we will provide to China what was agreed to, including Chinese students using our colleges and universities (which has always been good with me!).”
Trump indicated that tariffs between the two countries would remain unchanged from the recent Geneva agreement, where the US slashed its import duties on Chinese products from 145 per cent to 30 per cent, and China lowered its tariffs on US goods from 125 per cent to 10 per cent.
Workers dig at a rare earth mine in Ganxian county in central China’s Jiangxi province. Few imagined the risks of China dominating more than 70 per cent of global supplies and over 90 per cent of processed metals and magnets.Credit: AP
However, Trump wrote that US tariffs on China would be “a total of 55 per cent.”
A White House official later clarified that the 55 per cent included a 10 per cent baseline tariff, a 20 per cent tariff tied to fentanyl trafficking, and 25 per cent levies on imports from China that were put in place during Trump’s first term in the White House.
In a statement published by Chinese state media, Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng said the two sides should “show the spirit of good faith in abiding by their commitments and jointly safeguard the hard-won results of the dialogue”. But the statement did not provide details of what was agreed to.
The Geneva 90-day window is due to expire in August. It is unclear whether the two sides intended to continue negotiations in line with that deadline.
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US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said no further meetings had been scheduled, but the two sides talked frequently.
With agencies
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