China pushes for further talks to hammer out Trump ‘phase one’ deal

China reportedly wants more talks to hammer out details on a trade deal promoted by President Trump before it is signed by Chinese President Xi Jinping. 

The country could send a delegation including Vice Premier Liu He to finalize a written deal to be signed at a summit next month, a person familiar told Bloomberg News. Another person told the news outlet that China wants to end a planned December tariff increase in addition to an increase scheduled for this week, which the administration hasn’t yet backed.  

{mosads}After talks last week, President Trump said that a “phase one” deal had been reached, while Liu said progress had been made.

“We’ve come to a very substantial phase one deal,” Trump said. 
 
“We have come to a deal, pretty much, subject to getting it written. It’ll take probably three weeks, four weeks, or five weeks,” he said. 

“We’re going to be in Chile together for a big summit. And maybe it’ll be then, or maybe it’ll be sometime around then,” he added. 

Liu after the negotiations mentioned progress had been made.

“We are making a lot of progress towards a positive direction,” he said. “We have made substantial progress in many fields. We are happy about it. We’ll continue to make efforts.”

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang told Bloomberg Monday that both sides made progress and that he hopes “the U.S. will work with China and meet each other halfway.”

Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin told CNBC on Monday that he expects to have a deal, but if not, tariffs will go into place on Dec. 15.