US PRESIDENT DONALD Trump has reportedly signed an order delaying the reimposition of higher tariffs on Chinese goods, hours before a trade truce between Washington and Beijing was due to expire.

The halt on steeper tariffs will be in place for another 90 days, the Wall Street Journal and CNBC reported, citing Trump administration officials.

The White House did not respond to queries on the matter.

While the United States and China slapped escalating tariffs on each other’s products this year, reaching prohibitive triple-digit levels and snarling trade, both countries in May agreed to temporarily lower them.

But their 90-day halt of steeper levies was due to expire Tuesday.

Asked about the deadline earlier, Trump said: “We’ll see what happens. They’ve been dealing quite nicely. The relationship is very good with President Xi (Jinping) and myself.”

Trump also touted the tariff revenue his country has collected since his return to the White House, saying “we’ve been dealing very nicely with China.”

“We hope that the US will work with China to follow the important consensus reached during the phone call between the two heads of state,” Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Lin Jian said in a statement.

He added that Beijing also hopes Washington will “strive for positive outcomes on the basis of equality, respect and mutual benefit.”

The full text of Trump’s latest order has yet to be released. The 90-day extension means the truce is set to expire in early November, according to the Wall Street Journal.

Shaky truce

Even as both countries reached a pact to cool tensions after high level talks in Geneva in May, the de-escalation has been shaky.

In June, key economic officials convened in London as disagreements emerged and US officials accused their counterparts of violating the pact. Policymakers met again in Stockholm last month.

US trade envoy Jamieson Greer said last month that Trump will have the “final call” on any such extension.

Trump said in a social media post late Sunday that he hoped China will “quickly quadruple its soybean orders,” adding that this would be a way to balance trade with the United States.

For now, the extension of a truce means that US tariffs on Chinese goods this year stand at 30%.

Under their de-escalation, Beijing’s corresponding levy on US products stood at 10%.

Since returning to the presidency in January, Trump has slapped a 10% “reciprocal” tariff on almost all trading partners, aimed at addressing trade practices Washington deemed unfair.

This surged to varying steeper levels last Thursday for dozens of economies.

Major partners like the European Union, Japan and South Korea now see a 15% US duty on many products, while the level went as high as 41% for Syria.

The “reciprocal” tariffs exclude sectors that have been separately targeted, such as steel and aluminium, and those that are being investigated like pharmaceuticals and semiconductors.

They are also expected to exclude gold, although a clarification by US customs authorities made public last week caused concern that certain gold bars might still be targeted.

Trump also said that gold imports will not face additional tariffs, without providing further details.

The US president has taken separate aim at individual countries such as Brazil over the trial of former president Jair Bolsonaro, who is accused of planning a coup, and India over its purchase of Russian oil.

Canada and Mexico come under a different tariff regime.

Chips deal

Meanwhile, chips giants Nvidia and AMD agreed to share 15% of their revenues from chip sales to China with the US government, a government official confirmed.

Trump’s administration halted the sale of advanced computer chips to China back in April over national security concerns, but Nvidia and AMD revealed in July that Washington would allow them to resume sales of the H20 and MI308 chips, which are used in artificial intelligence development.

The official, who insisted on anonymity to discuss a policy not yet formally announced, confirmed the revenue sharing terms of the deal, and said the broad strokes of the initial report by The Financial Times were accurate.

The FT reported that Nvidia and AMD agreed to the financial arrangement as a condition for obtaining export licence to resume sales to China.

Back in July, Nvidia argued that tight export controls around their chip sales would cost the company an extra 5.5 billion US dollars (£4 billion).

They have argued that such limits hinder US competition in a sector in one of the world’s largest markets for technology, and have also warned that US export controls could end up pushing other countries toward China’s AI technology.

Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick told CNBC in July that the renewed sale of Nvidia’s chips in China was linked to a trade agreement made between the two countries on rare earth magnets.

Restrictions on sales of advanced chips to China have been central to the AI race between the world’s two largest economic powers, but such controls are also controversial.

Proponents argue that these restrictions are necessary to slow China down enough to allow US companies to keep their lead.

- © AFP 2025