China's Long Game: Patience Is a Virtue in Its Talks With the US

Beijing seems ready to bide its time while it looks for an advantage

- Karishma Vaswani

American President Donald Trump's trade war was meant to rebalance global power in America's favor. Instead, China is playing the long game, enduring short-term economic pain to shape any eventual deal to its advantage.

The strategy appears to be working—for now. On Monday, Washington granted Beijing another 90-day reprieve, extending a pause on tariffs through 10 November. China announced it would do the same. Markets welcomed the move, which offered some relief after months of tension. The delay will give Chinese President Xi Jinping's policymakers more time to plan their next move.

Time is Xi's ally. So far, the clearest outcome of each round of talks has been a commitment to meet again. Despite Trump's insistence that China has taken significant steps to improve their trade relationship, Beijing has not offered any consequential concessions on any of his key concerns.

The extension has come at a delicate time for the economy, which is plagued by sluggish domestic demand and a slowdown in the property sector. Bloomberg Economics says that China is among the few major nations without a clear timeline or terms for a deal, while others have struck agreements to secure lower tariffs. Even with this reprieve, it notes, Beijing faces average US tariffs of 40%—almost 25 percentage points above the global average.