Trump's China visit set to test fragile truce

U.S. President Donald Trump will visit China this week to meet President Xi Jinping, testing a fragile trade truce between the world's two largest economies [1]. It will be the first such visit by a U.S. president in nearly a decade [1]. Executives from major U.S. companies, including Boeing, Citigroup, and Qualcomm, are expected to accompany the president, potentially to make deals with Chinese firms [1]. The visit marks a pivotal moment in a trade conflict that began in 2018 when Trump announced tariffs on $250bn of Chinese imports [1]. A tit-for-tat trade war ensued, with the two nations hitting each other with tariffs that topped 100% [1]. Those tariffs were paused after Trump and Xi's last face-to-face meeting in South Korea in October [1]. However, Trump unveiled sweeping new import taxes on countries across the world in April 2025 [1]. His administration is now likely to push Beijing to make more purchases from vital U.S. industries, such as soybeans and aircraft parts [1]. The visit comes as Trump deals with a legal setback to his trade policies after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down his so-called Liberation Day tariffs, forcing him to impose a temporary 10% levy on all countries under a separate law [1].