Bessent Leads Trade Talks With China In Paris Ahead Of Trump-Xi Summit

Ahead of the upcoming Trump-Xi summit, China and US have begun a fresh round of trade talks to set the stage for the main event. 

Trade negotiators led by US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer and China’s Vice Premier He Lifeng held talks in Paris on Sunday to map out plans for a leaders’ summit later this month. The first day of the talks concluded around 6 pm local time, and the delegations will meet again on Monday, Bloomberg reported. The trade negotiators are expected to review the latest developments in a truce reached in November and discuss topics including the war in Iran as well as investment and purchases.

According to Bloomberg, Bessent, Greer and He have a history of bilateral negotiations. They met in Geneva last May to launch a series of talks that saw follow-on sessions in London, Stockholm, Madrid and Kuala Lumpur. That resulted in a truce under which Washington and Beijing lowered tariffs and export restrictions. Chinese Vice Finance Minister Liao Min and Vice Commerce Minister Li Chenggang are also at the talks. 

Bessent said on Thursday that his team will continue to deliver results that put America’s farmers, workers and businesses first. China’s commerce ministry said Friday the two sides are set to discuss “trade and economic issues of mutual concern.”

In January, Greer said the two sides could try to focus on reaching an agreement on trade in non-sensitive sectors in talks ahead of Trump’s visit to China.

The outcomes will set the stage for President Donald Trump’s trip to China from March 31 to April 2, the first visit by an American president to Beijing in nearly a decade.

The talks also marks the first time the two sides are meeting since the US Supreme Court ruled Trump didn’t have the authority to impose tariffs using the International Emergency Economic Powers Act — a tool he used to threaten levies as high as 145% on China.

The Trump administration has since introduced an across-the-board tariff of 10% and vowed to recreate parts of its tariff wall using other authorities. Greer kicked off the process of imposing tariffs under his agency’s Section 301 authority by initiating an investigation into allegations of industrial overcapacity and forced labor practices for several economies, including China.

Trump’s visit to China will be the first for a U.S. president since he went in his first term in 2017. It will come five months after the two leaders met in the South Korean city of Busan and agreed to a one-year truce in a trade war that temporarily saw tit-for-tat tariffs soar to triple digits before the two sides climbed down. 

Still, trade remains a source of tensions. The commerce ministry on Friday hit back against the Trump administration’s new trade investigation into 16 trading partners, including China. The investigation - which came after a Supreme Court ruling struck down Trump’s sweeping global tariffs that were imposed last year - could pave the way for new tariffs.

Another issue that could be discussed is the Iran war, especially when global anxiety is soaring over oil prices and supplies. Trump said Saturdaythat he hopes China, France, Japan, South Korea, the United Kingdom and others will send warships to keep the Strait of Hormuz “open and safe.”

Before Sunday’s talks, Gary Ng, a senior economist at French bank Natixis and a research fellow at the Central European Institute of Asian Studies, said the Paris meeting is likely the most important bilateral one before the Xi-Trump summit.

The key issue is “whether China and the U.S. can agree on what is agreed and manage disagreement. Iran is a new factor, but Beijing is more concerned about the flip-flopping of U.S. policies,” he said.

Last week, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said it would be a “big year” for China-U.S. relations. While he did not confirm the state visit, Wang said that “the agenda of high-level exchange is already on the table.”