Phase One

President Trump has announced “phase one” of  a US-China trade deal ... despite the fact that he has previously stated that he wanted all the trade disputes settled at once. Yes, he has gotten “commitments” from China on big agricultural buys, openings for financial services, intellectual property protections, currency guarantees and other trade deficit reductions ... but we have seen most of this Beijing slight-of-hand before. Kind reader, for the actual details, see: NBC Story. The real issue is — will China put all these concessions into writing over the next few weeks in exchange for Trump holding off on some tariff increases?

History teaches me to be skeptical ... but if this first phase does happen, it sure helps Trump to get re-elected. In fact, it may well be that Xi has concluded that, despite all the US political cross currents, Trump is likely to be his adversary for five more years ... which could mean much more economic pain for his Eastern fiefdom ... unless he acts now.

Afterthought: Watched Steve Bannon’s Friday interview on CNBC. He said that the vacuum at the top of the Democrat primary race (Hunter Biden’s mess and Bernie’s heart attack) likely will entice Hillary and/or Bloomberg into the race ... and, at least Hillary would try to get to the right of Trump on China. If he is right, maybe Xi is reading these same tea leaves ... and now finds Trump to be the preferred alternative.

Interesting!