Photo Credit: Reuters
U.S. and Chinese officials concluded a first day of talks in Madrid on Sunday on their strained trade ties, a looming divestiture deadline for Chinese short-video app TikTok, amid Washington's demands that its allies place tariffs on imports from China over its purchases of Russian oil.
U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told reporters as he left the central government palace: "We’ll start again in the morning."
Talks between delegations led by Bessent and U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer with Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng and China's top trade negotiator, Li Chenggang, at the baroque Palacio de Santa Cruz, which houses Spain's foreign ministry ended after about six hours.
They mark the fourth time in four months that the delegations have met in European cities to try to keep a fractured U.S.-China trade relationship from collapsing under President Donald Trump's tariffs.
They last met in Stockholm in July where they agreed in principle to extend for 90 days a trade truce that sharply reduced triple-digit retaliatory tariffs on both sides and restarted the flow of rare-earth minerals from China to the United States.
Trump has approved the extension of current U.S. tariff rates on Chinese goods, totaling about 55%, until November 10.
TIKTOK DEADLINE EXTENSION LIKELY
Trade experts said there was little likelihood of a substantial breakthrough in the talks hosted by Spain.
The most likely result of the Madrid talks is seen as another extension of a deadline for the popular TikTok app's Chinese owner, ByteDance, to divest its U.S. operations by September 17 or face a U.S. shutdown.
A source familiar with the Trump administration's discussions on TikTok's future said the deadline would be extended for a fourth time since Trump took office in January.
TikTok has not been discussed in previous rounds of U.S.-China trade talks in Geneva, London or Stockholm. But the source said the issue's public inclusion as an agenda item on the Treasury's announcement of the talks gives the Trump administration political cover for another extension.
