https://archive.is/FKuhi (reuters)
https://archive.is/MIdNc (afp)
Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng met for about eight hours with U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer in Geneva in their first face-to-face meeting since the world's two largest economies heaped tariffs well above 100% on each other's goods.
U.S. President Donald Trump said on Friday that an 80% tariff on Chinese goods "seems right", suggesting for the first time a specific alternative to the 145% levies he has imposed on Chinese imports.
Neither side made any statements about the substance of the discussions nor signaled any progress towards reducing crushing tariffs as meetings at the residence of Switzerland's ambassador to the U.N. concluded at about 8 p.m. local time. (1800 GMT)
The discussions are expected to restart on Sunday in the Swiss city, according to an individual familiar with the talks, who was not authorized to speak publicly.
The 80% number is just something that Trump posted on his social media early on Friday morning, before any meeting ever happened.
UPDATE Trump posted on truthsocial, 1 hour ago. He describes the meeting with the phrases "total reset" and "great progress". I won't believe this until I hear the perspective from China's government.
The point is not that China will “lose”, which is why I think a lot of people and spectators of this US-China trade war are missing. The Chinese economy is strong enough that even with continual assault from the US, it’s going to survive. Just look at Japan’s zero growth trajectory for the past 35 years, did Japan “collapse”? No, it’s doing just fine, just that it won’t enjoy a spectacular growth any longer.
The crucial point, however, is whether China is interested in forging a new economic model - a socialist one - that serves as an alternative to the current neoliberal system. This is what is going to determine if the rest of the world (i.e. the Global South) can be emancipated from the financial and economic hegemony of the US empire.
So far, China seems interested in retaining the pre-Trump status quo, as the huge trade imbalance run by the US and China over the past few decades have strongly benefited both countries, to the expense of the rest of the world. In fact, if you think about it, the US working class lose more due to deindustrialization while their bourgeoisie reaped all the benefits.
What I am saying is that China has to step up and play the global consumer role is the US is going to step back from spending money, simply because our global economy has been shaped for the past 50 years by US turning itself into a permanent deficit spender.
If the US scales back on its spending, then somebody else has to step up and spend, so as to absorb the surplus capacity in the export economies. Otherwise China will be competing with everyone else selling low value added manufacturing goods to one another, and of course the poorer economies will lose out in this pure mercantilistic fight, priming them to be harvested by the IMF and foreign capital.
China is the only country in the world today with a strong manufacturing capacity and robust financial system to play that role. A few years ago, the EU could be a big player, but with Nord Stream bombing hiking their energy input prices, the EU is now in austerity and leaning into militarization, so it could no longer play this role.