US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent announced that China had agreed to buy 12 million metric tons (13.28 tons) of soybeans this year and at least 25 million annually through 2028, a key issue for anxious US farmers after Beijing stopped buying.
Bessent also said on Fox News that China has approved the transfer agreement for the short video app TikTok. But he provided no details other than to add that he expected the deal to move forward in the near future.
The Dutch government is under renewed pressure to end its seizure of the Chinese-owned, Netherlands-based semiconductor company Nexperia, after Washington agreed to suspend its updated export control rule for one year.
After a meeting between Chinese President Xi Jinping and his US counterpart Donald Trump on Thursday, China’s Ministry of Commerce said Washington would temporarily halt the implementation of its so-called 50 per cent subsidiary rule.
Introduced in late September, that rule expanded US export restrictions to any company that was at least 50 per cent owned by entities on Washington’s trade blacklist.
The one-year suspension is expected to complicate the geopolitical dispute surrounding Nexperia, a critical supplier of semiconductors with automotive, industrial, mobile and consumer applications.
The Dutch government’s action, which included the ousting of Nexperia CEO Zhang Xuezheng, was partly a reaction to the anticipated effects of the new US rule.
