Have we heard any solidified agreements from the white House from the U.S.

side? And what are we waiting for?

Still, to get some details on concepts of a deal, which is pretty well done.

Um, yeah. And we're starting to hear from the

Chinese. They did agree to lower tariffs on a

certain range of products. Uh, they referenced the agricultural

sector. Um, they did confirm the plane deal,

although they didn't give specifics, uh, that the president referred to yesterday

on the way back, uh, from Beijing. Uh, we are still waiting to hear from

the white House. Uh, a bit more.

Again, the details remain scant here, and I think until we have more, we can't

really break down. Just, um, you know how much economic

cooperation there is here. I think some of this is signaling.

Of course. Courtney, it's a quiet weekend for the

president. He has executive time, as he calls it,

today and tomorrow, but nothing else on the official schedule.

Um, how is the white House contextualizing the trip that just

wrapped up here? I think a lot's been made of the

closeness of the relationship is the US sees it, or as the administration sees

it, between President Trump and President XI, and they've nodded to the

fact that there's been this invitation for President XI to come to the states

in September, and they'll be these other opportunities on the heels of that, for

these two leaders to get together. How much emphasis are they placing on

these deliverables amidst some criticism?

I think that maybe the numbers weren't as big as a lot of people, especially on

Wall Street, thought they would be. And there wasn't kind of a dialing back

of of the tariffs that were put in place to the extent that a lot of people

expected. Yeah, I mean, I think there was huge

expectation going into this that this was going to largely focus on, uh, you

know, stabilizing trade, um, talking about Iran, uh, and any cooperation the

US could get with China there in terms of, uh, you know, international support.

Um, but I think the white House has so far framed this as a huge success.

We heard from the president yesterday. Um, you know, he has praised it as a

fantastic visit. He very much was, um, you know, Regaled

by all the pomp and pageantry that she had rolled out for him.

Um, but a lot of this, you know, as you said, we saw you, uh, Treasury Secretary

Scott Benson and U.S. trade rep, uh, Jamison Greer sort of lay

the groundwork for some of the deals that we've heard about so far.

Uh, talking about setting up a board of trade to, um, you know, open up

investment in non-critical sectors. Uh, again, you know, we we had expected

with the cadre of CEOs, us CEOs, um, attending this summit that there would

be more deals on, uh, opening up China, China's market.

Uh, we have yet to see that. Um, I think there was huge expectation

that I would be a huge talking point with the addition, the last minute

addition of Nvidia's Jensen Wang, uh, who jumped on Air Force One in Alaska.

Um, but none of that seemed to come to fruition.

And, you know, we'll be watching in the days ahead to see, uh, if any of those

deals, anything along those sort of deals might materialize from the white

House. Courtney, don't go anywhere we want to

bring in Jennifer while she's Bloomberg Economics chief geo economics analyst.

The other thing that I feel like Jennifer, we didn't hear as much about,

and we're expecting to or a lot of industries folks were hoping to was some

more cooperation on critical minerals. Uh, China has really the lockdown not

only on on the actual minerals themselves, but almost all of the

refinement now is done there in the processing, even when they're coming

from other places, including Australia. Do we make any progress there?

Is there any inclination that this was even discussed to a significant amount?

And if not, what does that mean? You're absolutely right.

That was kind of the elephant in the room that China wields this massive

leverage over critical minerals. It was the focus of a showdown between

the US and China last year after President Trump type tariffs.

And even though China has put in place licensing and other regulations to allow

the flow of many of those minerals to resume to United States, there are still

restrictions, particularly on those that are headed for defense and users, and

that's obviously a concern of the United States is going to need to bring back

stockpiles of munitions that's used up in Iran.

And also this lingering question of some regulations that China has put in place

over the last few months that seem to be aimed at frustrating any efforts by the

U.S. or its allies to de-risk and to develop

an alternative, diversified supply chains away from China.

But as you mentioned, that didn't seem to come up in the meeting, and there's

no clarity on whether there's going to be any further relaxation from the

Chinese side, or this is going to continue to be a focal point of

tensions. Jeffrey, let me focus on another supply

chain. I know you've been paying very close

attention to for a long while now, and that's the supply chain involving ships,

especially those that are made on Taiwan.

Of course, Taiwan did come up, brought up first by President XI.

And we've seen President Trump talk more about it on the heels of President Xi's

comments, although there was a delay in terms of the U.S.

responding to what the Chinese president had to say.

But in an interview with Brett Bear on Fox News, the president was asked about

that supply chain, the chip supply chain in Taiwan.

And here's what he had to say. I'd like to see everybody making chips

over in Taiwan coming to America, because to be honest with you, I think

it's the greatest thing you can do because it's a heated situation.

There's no question about it. And, uh, as you know, we have massive

amounts of chip companies now from Taiwan already coming in.

We expect to have 40 to 50% of the world chip business by the end of my term.

And, uh, I think it should be even more than that.

I think all of those chip companies that if they're smart, they're going to start

heading to Arizona and the places where they're building, that's going to be a

problem, that's going to solve your problem, the president said.

So Jeffers kind of situate that in the broader conversation surrounding Taiwan.

I think there are probably a lot of lawmakers who are a bit startled by the

fact that there wasn't a more forceful message from President Trump about

Taiwan, about this weapons deal. And then you had him really expounding

quite a bit here on this, this one commercial side of that relationship,

your reaction to it. And again, kind of I'd love for you to

situate that in the broader conversation about the relationship as it stands.

So I think heading into the summit, there was a lot of concern, including

for myself as someone who used to be in charge of the writing, these talking

points for the president about what the discussion on time would be, because it

requires really careful, delicate language.

And President Trump is known from straying from formal talking points.

I think what you heard, including in that interview and what he said on the

ground, including to reporters, wasn't necessarily the worst case scenario for

Taiwan, but it was far from a full throated defense of both US policy to

support Taiwan's defense and the idea of deterring China from ever testing that

proposition. And I think there's a couple of reasons

for that. First, Trump has always been skeptical

about supporting Taiwan and other partners.

That's something that actually Bloomberg News has reported on for years,

including when he was last on the campaign trail.

The second factor is I think he's quite cognizant of China's leverage over

critical minerals. And he probably heard, not just

publicly, from XI in remarks before the meeting began, but privately and behind

closed doors. How Beijing is quite concerned about

U.S. arms sales, especially this reported $14

billion package that is apparently waiting on President Trump's signature.

He was pretty Non-committal on what he would do with that package once he gets

back in Washington. And that alone is a deviation from U.S.

policy, which is to support Taiwan's defense, including through arms sales,

and not negotiate those sales with Beijing.

Courtney, I also want to ask you about the visit that's coming on the heels of

this visit. And that's President Putin has announced

this morning that he will be heading to Beijing for a visit as well.

There is a theory, and Putin is has allegedly been a big proponent of this

theory of spheres of influence. His argument is that Russia should get

free rein in Ukraine and Eastern Europe, China should get free rein in Asia, and

the president, Trump and the Americans can handle our own hemisphere.

This has been an argument that depending on the day or who's been in front of

him, the president seems to be amenable to, if not all in so far.

What does it say to you that Putin is going to meet with XI, two people who

would very much like the U.S., to take a step back in both of those theaters

right on the heels of this summit. And I wonder who you think they'll be

talking about while they're in the room together.

Well, the obvious answer is Donald Trump, of course.

Right. So, you know, this is something, uh,

President Putin said he was watching, uh, Trump's, uh, visit very closely.

Um, uh, it should come as no surprise that he would want to follow up with a

visit to XI to make sure they're completely aligned.

Um, to your point about the spheres of influence, that is something that the

US, um, largely agreed with in the national security, um, statement they

released last year, uh, in which they wanted to reassert U.S.

dominance in the Western Hemisphere. They've, of course, uh, seemingly gotten

a little distracted in Iran. Um, but, uh, you know, this is something

that, uh, I'd expect, uh, I didn't it didn't come as a surprise to me to to

hear that, uh, Vladimir Putin would be traveling to China on the heels of

Donald Trump's visit. You've taken us right to where I wanted

us to go. Uh, and, Jennifer, I want to ask you

just about the broader strategy the U.S. has toward China and maybe to tee up

that part of this conversation. Let me play a bit of sound that our

colleague Michelle Hussain had a conversation with Kishore Mahbubani, the

former president of Singapore. Let's hear what he had to say about the

role that the US is playing vis a vis China, and how much success the U.S.

could have of keeping China at bay. It's not a wise policy of the United

States to stop the rise of China, because China can no longer be stopped.

And the only way to stop China is to ask the Chinese government to stop improving

the livelihood of its own people. Right.

If you want China to this only, this is the only way the China will stop

growing. But China still has a long way to go.

Its per capita income is way behind that.

Uh, of the United States is a long way to go.

I misspoke, I remember Bonnie, the former Singaporean diplomat.

But Jennifer, let me go to you on on that point as Christina talks about

these spheres of influence, um, how even are those spheres?

How much influence do you see the U.S. having here, and how much time and

attention and eagerness. Does the US, under President Trump, have

to stop the stop sign to the degree that it can?

I think that's a major risk in Trump's second term, especially with the ongoing

war in the Middle East, which is quite literally pulling time, resources and

energy out of the Indo-Pacific and directing them towards the Middle East,

including missile defense systems that, for example, our Asian allies very much

depend on. And what that symbolic of is something

that's been a trend in U.S. foreign policy for over a decade now,

which is a desire to want to focus on the Indo-Pacific, the world's most

dynamic economic region, home to places, as you mentioned, David, Taiwan critical

supply chains and yet constantly getting pulled in other directions and

distractions. And I think that continues to be a theme

here, even though President Trump just made this trip to China.

What's interesting is he didn't stop anywhere else along the way.

And that's sort of a departure from precedent.

Normally, U.S. presidents make a China trip part of a

larger trip to the region and use it as an opportunity to signal U.S.

presence everywhere there. And in this case, that was sort of a

missed opportunity. Christina, you were there when Trump

walked across the border into North Korea.

I was and that was a multi-part trip as well.

And I covered Pompeo the first term. And every time we went to Asia, we

served in Vietnam every single time. We always hit different places.

The U.S. was trying to get agreements with

Courtney very quickly. Before we let you go, um, we've pivoted

to Asia. We've pivoted back.

He's back in D.C., the president doing executive time.

What is next up on the agenda as far and far as as far as foreign policy meetings

go with the president? Well, I think we'll be watching to see

if the president, um, follows through with a call to Taiwan's president ly.

He made reference to this. Uh, he said he needed to speak to the

person who is running Taiwan, um, which appeared to be a reference to President

Ly. Um, uh, so we'll be watching to see if

that phone call happens. That, of course, would draw, uh, China's

ire. Um, but I expect we'll also hear, uh,

the president speaking to a lot of Republicans, uh, who are trying to shape

what happens next, okay. And push, uh, Trump towards signing off

on this arms deal.