New U.S.-China Trade Talks to Happen Soon

Markets reacted positively to an announcement on Thursday that there will be a fresh round of trade talks taking place between the U.S. and China before the end of the month. According to an announcement by the Ministry of Commerce, a Chinese delegation led by Vice Minister of Commerce Wang Shouwen will meet a delegation of American trade experts led by Under Secretary of Treasury for International Affairs David Malpass.

Though news of the upcoming meeting was regarded widely as a positive step towards halting the trade war, Reuters reports that many Washington policymakers are concerned that the talks won’t yield real results because the American delegation is comprised of lower-level representatives, not more powerful actors from the U.S. Trade Representative. China has said that it won’t accept any unilateral trade decisions but that it welcomes new talks about the issues.

Another factor that may stave off real progress is the significant gap between Washington’s demands and Beijing’s intentions. Washington has demanded that China improve market access and intellectual property protections for American companies and to lower the high U.S. trade deficit with China, and Beijing has been adamantly opposed to giving in on these issues thus far. The U.S. trade deficit with China now sits at $375 billion.

The date for the meeting has not yet been set, and with $16 billion of new tariffs on Chinese goods expected to start on August 23, time is of the essence. U.S. stock futures headed higher on news of the talks after all three major Wall Street indexes closed lower on Wednesday. European markets were also higher on Thursday, helping to boost U.S. stock futures further. Asian shares ended mostly lower for the day.

Sara Patterson
Sara Patterson has a Master’s Degree in political science and enjoys analyzing both current events and the international markets to get a fuller perspective of the currency market. Before turning to financial writing, she taught English writing skills to high-school age students. Sara’s work has been published on various financial and Forex blogs.