Trump and Xi open Beijing summit with Taiwan and trade tensions

For Donald Trump, the clearest near-term prize was a set of deliverables he could present as proof that the talks mattered. Analysts expected any concrete outcome to be modest, such as Chinese purchases of U.S. agricultural products or Boeing aircraft, while Trump also arrived with a broader commercial cast in tow, including Elon Musk, Tim Cook, Larry Fink and Boeing chief executive Kelly Ortberg. That lineup underscored how much the White House wanted the Beijing trip to produce headlines with market value, even if the room for a major breakthrough remained limited.

Xi’s leverage centered on Taiwan, which he treated as the core political issue in the relationship. Reuters reported that Xi told Trump trade talks were making progress, but warned that disagreement over Taiwan could push ties down a dangerous path and even toward conflict. CNBC said Xi described Taiwan as the “most important issue” in the bilateral relationship, a reminder that Beijing was not offering flexibility on what it sees as a sovereignty question. In practical terms, that meant Taiwan was less a bargaining chip than a red line.

The summit’s limits were sharpened by the Iran war, which had already delayed and complicated progress on other items, especially tariffs and rare earths. CNBC reported that Trump had considered asking China to help pressure the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, showing how the agenda had expanded beyond bilateral trade into broader strategic crisis management. Yet even with that wider scope, the likely result looked more like stabilization than resolution.