Trump-Xi Beijing Summit Has the Whole World Watching
CNBC reported Sunday that the Trump-Xi summit scheduled for Thursday in Beijing carries some of the highest geopolitical stakes of any bilateral meeting in recent memory. The agenda stretches from tariffs and rare earths to Taiwan, artificial intelligence and the ongoing Iran war.
A Sprawling Agenda With No Easy Answers
President Donald Trump and Chinese leader Xi Jinping are expected to negotiate across an unusually wide range of contested issues. China’s suspension of rare earth and magnet exports has already disrupted supply chains for automakers across Europe, Japan and South Korea. Washington, meanwhile, has accused Beijing of running large-scale campaigns to acquire American AI technology illegally.
Peterson Institute senior fellow Chad Bown told CNBC that virtually every nation has a direct stake in what the two leaders decide. That pressure is being felt from Singapore to Brussels, even by governments that will have no seat at the table.
Background: A Meeting Long in the Making
The summit was originally set for March but was pushed back after the United States became embroiled in its war against Iran. That conflict has triggered the most severe global energy shock in decades, adding urgency to discussions around the Strait of Hormuz. Any joint US-China framework for reopening the waterway could provide near-term relief on oil prices, analysts noted.
Before Thursday’s summit, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng are set to meet in South Korea on Wednesday. Political risk firm Teneo’s managing director Gabriel Wildau said the preliminary talks may aim to prevent recent escalations — including US sanctions on Chinese refiners handling Iranian crude — from unraveling a truce the two sides reached in South Korea last year.
Taiwan Sits at the Top of the Agenda
Both governments have confirmed Taiwan will be a central topic. Beijing has reportedly pressed Washington to scale back security guarantees to Taipei and revise longstanding US policy toward the island. China regards Taiwan as its own territory, a position Taipei firmly rejects.
Bonnie Glaser of the German Marshall Fund warned that any ambiguous softening from Trump on Taiwan commitments would be the most destabilizing possible outcome of the meeting.
Cornell economics professor Eswar Prasad told CNBC the world is hoping the leaders can agree on at least a handful of issues and stop tensions from deepening further. A confrontational summit, he added, risks prolonged volatility that could cripple global trade and threaten what remains of the rules-based international order.
Trump has also signaled he wants Xi to visit Washington later this year, which would be Xi’s first trip to the US capital in a decade.
