President Donald Trump speaks at an Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation CEO luncheon in Gyoeongju, South Korea, Wednesday, Oct. 29, 2025.
Mark Schiefelbein/AP
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Mark Schiefelbein/AP
GYEONGJU, SOUTH KOREA – President Trump on Wednesday confidently predicted striking a deal with China’s leader in a bilateral meeting on the sidelines of the Asia Pacific Economic Forum, following a period of trade tensions that have threatened to escalate.
“I think we’re going have a deal, I think it will be a good deal for both, and that’s really a great result,” Trump told a lunch meeting of APEC business executives in the southern city of Gyeongju.
“That’s better than fighting and going through all sorts of problems,” he added ahead of the Thursday meeting with President Xi Jinping. “No reason for it.”
Trump said that he could reduce tariffs on Chinese goods in exchange for a commitment from Beijing to curb exports of chemicals used to make fentanyl.
“I expect to be lowering that because I believe that they’re going to help us with the fentanyl situation,” Trump told reporters en route to Gyeongju. “They’re going to be doing what they can do.”
The U.S. currently imposes a 20% tariff on Chinese imports, in addition to other tariffs, because the U.S. government believes China has not done enough to restrict fentanyl precursor exports.
In response, Beijing imposed retaliatory tariffs on U.S. soybeans. U.S. and Chinese economic officials met over the weekend in Malaysia to build the framework of a trade deal that would include China resuming purchases of U.S. soybeans.
The deal would also include China delaying the imposition of export restrictions on rare earths, while the U.S. would hold off on raising tariffs by 100%.
Both Beijing and Washington are trading accusations that the other side’s economic coercion is wreaking havoc on the global economy.
“This is China versus the world,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said about China’s rare earth export controls this month. “They have pointed a bazooka at the supply chains and the industrial base of the entire free world, and we’re not going to have it,” he said.
“The U.S. has raised tariffs so high that it’s brought globalization to the verge of breakdown,” says Zhu Feng, dean of the School of International Studies at Nanjing University in China.
He notes that besides tariffs, the U.S. has raised port fees this month on Chinese-owned or operated ships docking at U.S. ports. It has suggested controls on U.S. exports of software to China.
And it has proposed barring Chinese air carriers headed to and from the U.S. from flying through Russian airspace. China’s airlines have a cost advantage, because Russia allows Chinese carriers to transit their airspace, but not U.S. ones.
“You can make China accept your rise in tariffs. But you can’t keep overwhelmingly pounding on China so hard,” he says. “China’s retaliation is to show China and the world that the U.S. can’t just keep us cornered,” Zhu adds.
Trump has also mentioned that he wants to discuss nuclear arms control with Xi, and possibly include China in U.S.-Russia nuclear arms control negotiations.
Despite speculation that Trump might try to revive nuclear negotiations with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un on this trip, that now seems off the table.
Trump told South Korean President Lee Jae Myung at the start of bilateral talks that talks with Xi were his main goal. “We’re looking forward to seeing him [Xi], and that was our focus, really, for this visit.”
Trump told Lee he was aware that the two Koreas remain technically in a state of war, and assured Lee that “we will see what we can do to get that straightened out. You know that I’ll be working on this very hard.”
As Trump was visiting South Korea, Pyongyang said it had conducted successful cruise missile tests.
