A 100-day plan to address trade imbalances between China and the US was the most important outcome of the two presidents’ meeting last week in Mar-a-Lago, Florida, according to the Financial Times. The details of the plan are still unclear, but are likely to include Chinese concessions on everything from agricultural imports to foreign investment in its financial sector, according to Chinese and US officials involved. US cabinet officials said the goal was to agree on a way to increase US exports to China and to reduce the $347bn trade deficit in goods between the two countries. According to Andrew Nathan, a Sinologist at Columbia University, plenty of low-hanging fruit is on offer. “US negotiators are pushing on a door that is relatively easy to open when they place a priority on improving the trade balance not by limiting Chinese exports to the US, but by increasing US exports to China,” he said.
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