U.S.-China Trade Talks on the Books for October, Says Beijing

Here we go again.

Days after the U.S. and China tariffed each other, both will meet again in October 2019 in a new attempt to tame the trade war, says Beijing.  After all, it’s needed after it’s done quite a bit of damage to the global economy, business investment, and overall confidence.

“Both sides agreed that they should work together and take practical actions to create good conditions for consultations,” the ministry said, as quoted by Reuters.

“Lead negotiators from both sides had a really good phone call this morning,” ministry spokesman Gao Feng said. “We’ll strive to achieve substantial progress during the 13th Sino-U.S. high-level negotiations in early October.”

All of this comes just days after the U.S. for introduced 15% levies on nearly $270 billion worth of consumer goods from China.  From here, the U.S. intends to raise tariffs on non-consumer goods to 30% by October 1, 2019.  

China retaliated, hitting soybeans and some U.S. auto parts with tariffs of up to 35%.

Worse, President Trump warned that he’d be tougher on Beijing in a second term if trade talks continue to drag on, compounding market fears.  Should that happen, we could easily find ourselves knee-deep in a global recession.