U.S. and Chinese officials said Monday that they had reached a deal to roll back most of their recent tariffs and call a 90-day truce in their trade war to allow for more talks on resolving their trade disputes.
Stock markets rose sharply as the world’s two major economic powers took a step back from a clash that has unsettled the global economy.
U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer says the U.S. agreed to drop its 145% tariff rate on Chinese goods by 115 percentage points to 30%, while China agreed to lower its rate on U.S. goods by the same amount to 10%.
The full impact on the complicated tariffs and other trade penalties enacted by Washington and Beijing remains unclear. And much depends on whether they will find ways to bridge longstanding differences during the 90-day suspension.
Bessent said in an interview with CNBC that U.S. and Chinese officials will meet again in a few weeks.
But investors rejoiced as trade envoys from the world’s two biggest economies blinked, finding ways to pull back from potentially massive disruptions to world trade and their own markets.
Futures for the S&P 500 jumped 2.6% and the Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 2%. Oil prices surged more than $1.60 a barrel and the dollar gained against the euro and the Japanese yen.
