China has agreed to the first major talks with the US since Donald Trump imposed sweeping tariffs and launched a global trade war.
Scott Bessent, the US treasury secretary, and Jamieson Greer, the US trade representative, will meet with their counterparts in Geneva this weekend.
It is a move Mr Bessent has described as a “de-escalation” amid growing market worry over the impact of the tariffs on the world economy, and working Americans.
Asked by the House Financial Services Committee whether trade negotiations with China were advanced, Mr Bessent said: “On Saturday we will begin, which I believe is the opposite of advanced.”
He added Pete Navarro, the White House trade adviser behind Mr Trump’s tariffs, would not be present for the negotiations.
Pressed for details on other trade deals, the treasury secretary said revealing such information would be “detrimental” to the US but claimed “some of them are quite advanced”.
He added that it was “time for China to graduate from developing country status” in the eyes of international financial institutions including the IMF and World Bank.
No country has been hit harder by Mr Trump’s trade war than China, the world’s biggest exporter and second largest economy.
When Mr Trump announced his “liberation day” tariffs on April 2, China retaliated with tariffs of its own, a move that Mr Trump called “disrespectful”.
The tit-for-tat tariffs have been mounting since then, with the US levies against China now at 145 per cent and China tariffs on the US at 125 per cent.
On Wednesday, JD Vance, the vice-president, suggested the Chinese population would have to “consume” rising costs in order to “rebalance” global trade.
“We cannot absorb hundreds of billions of dollars, close to a trillion dollars per year and annual surplus, most of it coming from the People’s Republic of China,” Mr Vance said.
“And what that’s going to mean in the rebalancing is that we think that the PRC is going to have to, frankly, let their own population consume a little bit more they’ve held consumption levels down in order to increase these massive exports.”
Mr Trump had claimed previously that the US and China were holding negotiations on lowering tariffs, which Beijing has denied, saying Trump must first lower his stiff tariffs.
The Chinese Commerce Ministry on Tuesday confirmed the meeting between its vice premier and Bessent in Switzerland.
“The Chinese side carefully evaluated the information from the US side and decided to agree to have contact with the US side after fully considering global expectations, Chinese interests and calls from US businesses and consumers,” said a ministry spokesperson.
The spokesperson said China would not “sacrifice its principles or global equity or justice in seeking any agreement.”