The Chinese Communist party officials have invited top Wall Street executives for an event called the "China-US Financial Roundtable" to be held on Sept. 16. The invitation was sent out on a short notice following new threats from U.S. President Donald Trump of new rounds of tariffs on practically all Chinese goods.
The Chinese officials have reportedly chosen the heads of the leading financial institutions in the United States according to three people who spoke with the Financial Times on condition of anonymity. The officials hoped that the roundtable group will be open to meeting regularly every six months moving forward.
The officials designated former Chinese central bank governor Zhou Xiaochuan and former Goldman Sachs executive and present chair of Barrick Gold John Thornton to jointly chair the roundtable group. The focus of discussions is how to improve and manage the Sino-US relations. The group is also expected to advise the Chinese government on financial and economic issues affecting Beijing, the sources said.
The list of Wall Street executives invited for the assembly includes Blackstone chairman Stephen Schwarzman, former Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson, and other top heads of the Citigroup, JPMorgan, Goldman, and Morgan Stanley. The invitation was officially sent by Fanx Xinghai, a vice-chairman at China's securities regulator who is currently handling the government's programs aimed at stopping the US-China trade war into full escalation.
Joining the Wall Street executives from China's side are People Bank of China's Yi Gang, banking and insurance regulator Guo Shuqing, and finance vice minister Liao Min.
The sources who spoke with the Financial Times explained the move showed how China is already frustrated with its unsuccessful discussion with U.S. President Donald Trump. The Chinese officials are reportedly unsatisfied with how U.S. trade representative Robert Lighthizer is handling the matter.
On Friday, Trump has threatened additional taxes on $267 billion of Chinese goods on top of the already planned tariffs to be imposed on $200 billion worth of goods. As expected, China vowed to impose retaliatory tariffs if the Trump administration went ahead with this.
Impacts of Trump's incessant stance on tariffs are felt by America's very own home-grown companies.
Reuters reported that a wide range of Apple products is to be hit by the fresh round of U.S. tariffs. The price hike will not be isolated for major products such as the Apple Watch, even keyboards, leather covers for iPhone and iPads will face tariffs.
Dell Technologies, Intel Corp., Fitness tracker FitBit, and Agilent Technologies expressed similar concerns to that of Apple. The companies were also concerned that increase production cost would stifle innovation and development of new tech products.
Office Depot, Newell Brand's Goody Products and Rubbermaid Commercial Products, Whirpool Corp, and Carrier Corp were concerned about problems in the supply chain and possible retrenchments on top of price hikes.
