President Donald Trump said the US and China have signed a trade agreement, adding that he expects to make a deal with India soon.
Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick told Bloomberg Television that the contract was signed earlier this week. Neither Lutnick nor Trump provided details regarding the agreement.
“We just signed with China the other day,” Trump said late Thursday.
Lutnick said the transaction was “signed and sealed” two days ago.
It was unclear whether the latest agreement would differ from what Trump announced two weeks ago. He said it would make it easier for American industries to acquire much needed magnets and rare earth minerals. The agreement cleared the path for trade talks to continue, but the US agreed to stop attempting to cancel Chinese citizens' visas on US university campuses.
China's Commerce Ministry said on Friday that both sides “have reviewed more details about the framework.” However, the statement did not explicitly mention access to rare earths, the minerals used in high-tech applications at the heart of the negotiations.
“China approves export applications for controlled items that meet the conditions in accordance with the law. The United States will cancel a series of restrictive measures made against China accordingly. It is expected that the United States and China will meet each other.”
The agreement, following initial talks in Geneva in early May, led to the postponement of a massive tariff hike that the two countries have threatened to freeze many trade between the two countries. The talks in London then set up a negotiation framework, and the deal Trump mentioned seemed to formalize the agreement.
“The president likes to close these deals himself. He is a deal maker. We're going to do business after the transaction,” Rutnick said.
Rare Earth Export
China has not announced a new agreement, but earlier this week it said it is speeding up approval for exporting rare earths, materials used in high-tech products such as electric vehicles. Beijing's restrictions on rare earth exports were a key point of competition.
China's Commerce Ministry said Thursday that Beijing has accelerated reviews of rare earth export license applications and approved “a certain number of compliant applications.”
Mineral export restrictions clearly prey on tariffs in the latest trade negotiations between Beijing and Washington after China imposed permit requirements for seven rare earth elements in April.
China has recently taken steps on the fentanyl issue, and last week announced that it will designate two more substances as precursor chemicals to fentanyl and be subject to production, transportation and export restrictions. Trump has called for Beijing to do more to stop the flow of such precursor components into Mexican drug cartels. These have imposed a 20% tariff on the fentanyl issue, the biggest part of the current 30% board-wide tax on Chinese goods, to use them to sell fentanyl in the US.
