Vietnam and the Philippines are the Southeast Asian countries closest to a trade deal with the U.S., said a former assistant U.S. trade representative on a webinar hosted by the Asia Program of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace on June 17.
Bloomberg reported that an Indonesian delegation's trip to Washington that had been scheduled for next week was canceled because its proposal to address its trade surplus was considered sufficient.
The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative is seeking comments on whether member countries of the Caribbean Basin Initiative (CBI) are meeting the criteria for their inclusion, as well as comments on CBI's operations itself, it said in a Federal Register notice.
A Polish official expressed optimism that the U.S. and European countries could hash out a trade deal soon, even as the 90-day timeline for the pause of reciprocal tariffs ends in less than a month.
The U.S. and China reached an agreement for Beijing to rein in export curbs on critical minerals, and for the U.S. to "provide to China what was agreed to," President Donald Trump said June 11, offering few details about the substance of the deal.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said that if 18 major trading partners negotiate in good faith, "it is highly likely ... we will roll the date forward to continue in good faith negotiations." He was referring to the July 9 deadline when country-specific reciprocal tariffs above 10% are due to return.
The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative is proposing to revise its upcoming Section 301 actions on the maritime, logistics and shipbuilding sectors, including fees for vehicle carriers and restrictions on maritime transport services.
Expert witnesses testified that the Harmonized Tariff Schedule code needs to be refined so that different sizes of semiconductor chips have their own numbers, and, more radically, suggested that the best way to mitigate overdependence on China for legacy chips is to require importers to report where the chips were designed and fabricated within products they are importing.
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum promised unspecified retaliatory measures against the U.S. for doubling tariffs on steel and aluminum, unless a deal is struck between the two countries before next week.
President Donald Trump got the phone call with Chinese President Xi Jinping he'd been seeking, and Trump wrote on social media that "there should no longer be any questions respecting the complexity of Rare Earth products."