What Trump and Xi will discuss during China visit – and what could go wrong

Donald Trump is making the first US presidential visit to China in almost a decade, at a time when an increasingly drawn-out conflict with Iran is hammering his approval ratings at home and leaving the Republican desperate for a visible foreign policy win.

It wasn’t supposed to be this way. Trump pushed back this summit from a planned date in late March to a time when the White House assumed its brief “excursion” in the Middle East would be over, allowing the Americans to negotiate from a position of strength.

Instead, the US seems no closer to wrapping up the war with Iran, and it is China that has come out of the situation looking like a beacon of stability, with its close ally Tehran still standing and its economy largely shielded from the global fallout of the Strait of Hormuz’s closure.

The Iran conflict is expected to feature prominently in the discussions between Trump and China’s Xi Jinping – and no doubt be a source of contention. But there are a host of other issues where it is in both Washington and Beijing’s interests to cooperate.

Though analysts generally have low expectations for major outcomes from the talks, even modest agreements between the world’ two largest economies could move markets.

Here’s what’s at stake in the two-day summit:

Trade war and tariffs

It is around six and a half months since Trump and Xi agreed what’s known as the “Busan Truce”, a pause to their trade war following talks at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in South Korea last year.

Tensions have remained high, however, with America's trade deficit with China still exceeding $200bn despite narrowing sharply in 2025.

Trump’s favoured weapon in trade talks – threatening to hike tariffs – was blunted by the US Supreme Court's decision in February that many of the previous tariffs were unlawful.

And so analysts expect the US president to take a more conciliatory tone, extending the tariffs truce while looking to secure promises of increased Chinese investment in America that he can present domestically as victories. It’s generally accepted that there won’t be any wider-reaching trade deal on the table, given the lack of the kind of diplomatic activity ahead of the summit that would have been needed to prepare such a pact.

"I see the trip more as a means to continue the 'Busan Truce' rather than one aiming at new grounds," Bert Hofman, professor at the East Asian Institute at the National University Singapore, tells The Independent. "Preparations have been limited, and there seems to be no major breakthrough in the pipeline."

A large business delegation from major American technology, finance and manufacturing firms is expected to accompany Trump to Beijing, and the US is likely to request ongoing access to Chinese critical minerals, so key to many of these industries. Beijing controls roughly 90 per cent of global rare earth refining, a majority of graphite processing, and significant shares of gallium and germanium – the materials that go into chips, telecommunications equipment and military hardware.

There is also talk of a possible aircraft deal involving Boeing and Chinese airlines that could include hundreds of 737 MAX jets – China's first major Boeing order since 2017 and a symbolic win for both leaders.

Still, analysts caution that major concessions remain unlikely. China's long-term strategy remains focused on self-reliance, and even where agreements have been reached in the past, implementation has often been slow or incomplete.

Iran, energy security and the Strait of Hormuz

The Iran war will weigh heavily in talks as it has also complicated the broader US-China relationship.

China maintains close economic and diplomatic ties with Iran, absorbing some 90 per cent of its exports. The double blockage of the Strait of Hormuz – a route critical to global oil supplies – has suddenly thrust China into the centre of Trump’s Middle East calculations.

The Trump administration has criticised Beijing for giving a critical financial lifeline to Tehran with its energy purchases and threatened banks with secondary sanctions if they worked with Chinese refiners engaging with Iranian oil.

China arrives at this summit in an unusually comfortable position.

“It has weathered the energy crisis better than expected and studiously avoided getting embroiled in the Iran situation, despite being an ostensible ally and biggest recipient of Iranian oil,” Jonathan Sullivan, director of China programs at the Asia Research Institute of UK’s Nottingham University, told The Independent.

“Watching the US get embroiled in a mess of its own making, weakening its alliances in the Middle East and perhaps fatally weakening the transatlantic alliance and so on is the Chinese strategy right now”, he added, referring to Nato.

Beijing is focused on what the Middle East looks like after the war ends and how China can position itself to fill whatever vacuum the US leaves behind. But it is not threatened in the near term, and it knows it.

“Trump is under water from different directions and could really do with China's help [most pressingly to sort out the Iran impasse, but also by getting a win on soybean orders or rare earths]” Sullivan argued.

Days before the summit, Iranian foreign minister Abbas Araghchi met Chinese counterpart Wang Yi in Beijing, where China called for the swift reopening of the strait. Analysts say the visit’s timing underscored Beijing’s role and a potential sway over Tehran in could influencing the direction of the conflict.

Taiwan at the centre of tensions

Amid the crowding of issues such as tariffs, export controls, and the war in Iran, Taiwan is where Beijing’s red lines really lie and for Trump it would be a tricky diplomatic line to toe.

China has been busy setting the scene. Days ahead of the summit, Beijing warned Washington to “safeguard the hard-won stability”, describing Taiwan as the biggest risk point between the two powers. During a call with US secretary of state Marco Rubio, Chinese foreign minister said the Taiwan issue concerned China’s “core interests”.

Taiwan is closely watching and the leadership has gone on record to suggest that Chinese communists may attempt some manoeuvring during ​the talks. Analysts also think China may try to persuade Trump to publicly use stronger language against Taiwan independence during the summit.

“No doubt Iran and Taiwan will be discussed, but there are little expectations for a breakthrough,” Hofman said.

Sullivan said the language around Taiwan will be parsed with unusual care. Beijing would dearly love Trump to say the US "opposes" Taiwan independence – a single word's shift from the current formulation of "doesn't support" it. The distinction looks semantic.

“This would be a huge win for China, but the likelihood is low. More likely the Chinese will state their position regarding Taiwan and maybe the Americans don't explicitly challenge it and the two official readouts are vague enough that each side can frame it per their own preferences,” he said.

According to reports, the Trump administration has delayed a $13bn arms package for Taiwan, including air defence missiles, to avoid upsetting Xi ahead of the summit.

The proposed package had already cleared preliminary congressional review earlier this year. But during a February call with Trump, Xi reportedly called Taiwan the “most important issue” in US-China relations and urged Washington to handle arms sales with “extreme caution”.

Trump has also given worrying signals to Taipei on his inconsistent foreign policy after repeatedly asking it to pay the US for its defence, saying “we’re no different than an insurance company”.

Artificial intelligence and technology rivalry

Artificial intelligence is emerging as another major flashpoint between the two powers as both race to dominate a technology increasingly seen as critical to economic and military power.

Although US and Chinese officials have discussed AI guardrails – including keeping the technology out of nuclear weapons systems –analysts say meaningful cooperation remains unlikely under Trump, whose administration has largely treated AI as a strategic advantage against China.

Since returning to office, Trump has rolled back several Biden-era AI safeguards, arguing excessive regulation could slow American innovation. He has described AI as a “beautiful baby” that needed to “thrive” without “foolish” rules holding it back.

“For Xi, if there is any, technology is the single most important objective. More access to US cutting-edge technology remains important for China, in particular in AI,” Hofman says.

The US has accused China of industrial-scale theft of American AI labs’ intellectual property. And China also moved to block Meta from acquiring Manus – a Chinese-founded AI startup now based in Singapore – highlighting Beijing’s growing concerns over sensitive technology and AI expertise flowing to the US.

What Xi wants

With Trump, if it doesn't move markets or shift a trade balance, it isn't worth the diplomatic friction – and Beijing has noticed.

"Beijing does not expect Trump to raise issues of human rights over the Uyghur minority in Xinjiang or Hong Kong. Nor is there any indication that Trump 2.0 is interested in raising any of these issues," said professor Steve Tsang, director at SOAS China Institute, told The Independent.

He said Xi is likely to make the most of Trump’s vanity to get the best deal possible for China and create the optics to please Trump over making any substantive concession to get economic or trade or tariff deals.

“Beijing will also try to capitalise on Trump’s personal affection for Xi to get its way. The real issue is not what the USA as a whole may want from China but if Trump can see through Xi’s game, exercise discipline to get deals that are actually good for the US. I won’t hold my breath on that,” he said.

Sullivan concludes that big substantive progress towards a trade deal or steering Iran towards a resolution to the war are not really in play at this meeting.

“But if the two sides can talk about the pressing issues and seek some common interest in resolving Iran and smoothing out the trade and tech 'war', it will be a positive development,” he added.

But the wild card is whether Trump says anything about Taiwan.

“If he makes the rhetorical concession China wants vs if he says something impolitic or too emphatic re US support for Taiwan would colour the entire meeting,” he added.

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