The U.S. is set to raise tariffs on Chinese imports on October 15.

That’s next week.

In the meantime, in fact later today, Chinese Vice Premier Liu will be meeting with Donald Trump.

Last time they were together, a number of pleasantries were exchanged but shortly after the White House raised tariffs and set the scene for the past 5 months of trade war escalation.

In fact, it’s now a trade-currency-capital-tech war.

Despite the President saying that a ‘mini-deal’ was going ‘really well’ and large US listed Chinese tech stocks being 3% to 5% up as I write, I’m not so sure that his version of ‘really well’ is the same as yours or mine.

A currency and tariff mini-deal that doesn’t address the larger issues is not really a deal - it’s just another reason to kick the can further.

As I’ve suggested before, it’s unlikely the White House wants a big result before the 2020 election, so it’s also unlikely (but not impossible) that the word ‘armistice’ features in the President’s play book, just at the minute.

Nonetheless, let’s see what happens.

Mike

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