US to extend China trade truce until January

US treasury secretary Scott Bessent said Wednesday that Washington and Beijing have agreed to a two-month extension of their trade truce, which was due to expire on Nov 10.

The deal came after marathon talks between Bessent and his Chinese counterpart vice-premier He Lifeng in New York on Sunday and in Washington on Wednesday.

The announcement came just as Chinese leader Xi Jinping arrived in the US for a high-stakes summit with President Donald Trump on Thursday.

“We have agreed today that we will extend what we call the Busan Agreement, the economic detente between the two countries that was scheduled to end on November 10th,” Bessent told Fox News in an interview.

“That is going to be extended until January 10th to give us more time to see what we can do on the economic front,” he added.

The truce, which took effect last year, came after Trump struck a deal with Xi.

The agreement saw both sides agree to reduce tit-for-tat tariffs and for the US to extend certain tariff exclusions.

Washington had also agreed at the time to suspend responsive actions after an investigation into China’s shipbuilding sector.

Bessent on Wednesday also flagged the possibility that both sides could reduce tariffs on US$30 billion of non-sensitive goods.

Following hours of talks involving Bessent, US trade envoy Jamieson Greer and their Chinese counterparts on Sunday, Greer told reporters that both teams were still working through this.

Besides trade, Washington and Beijing also discussed creating a notification mechanism to flag AI-related incidents or threats.