The Chinese Commerce Ministry officially announced that the Chinese Vice Premier Liu He will travel to the United States next week in order to sign phase one of the trade deal.
The meeting is expected to take place from January 13 to January 15, and until then, the parties will remain in close contact, said the commerce ministry spokesman, Gao Feng.
Phase 1 of the trade deal implies that China will increase its purchases of American goods (especially agricultural ones) by US $200 billion and address intellectual property issues in exchange for tariff cuts. However, the agreement has not been released yet and we still don't have a clear idea about its content.
The 18-month trade war has brought an unease environment in the global markets and has disrupted global supply chains and affected global manufacturing networks. In fact, the World Bank trimmed its economic growth forecast for last year and the current.
By 8:32 GMT the Chinese Yuan went up by 0.20 percent against the US dollar, hitting the 0.1443 level.
World Bank Expects Recovery Despite Trimming its Growth Prospects
On its Global Economic Prospects report, the world bank expects the world economy to grow 2.4 percent in 2019 (the slowest since the 2008 crisis) and 2.5 percent in 2020, adding that they expect an improvement in the upcoming years.
“This modest increase in global growth marks the end of the slowdown that started in 2018 and took a heavy toll on global activity, trade, and investment, especially last year,” said the world bank's main economic forecaster, “We do expect an improvement, but overall, we also see a weaker growth outlook,” he added.
The bank expects the increasing tensions in the middle east to have economic consequences in the future (though higher oil prices), it is noteworthy to add this appreciation was made before the current escalation of the conflict between the United States and Iran.
"The disruption in Saudi oil production in mid-September highlights the potential for renewed tensions in the Middle East," says the report.
Growth among advanced economies is expected to slow down due to a weakening manufacturing production, falling to 1.4 percent in 2020. Emerging economies are expected to grow 4.1 percent in 2020, though mainly dominated by a small group of economies.