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      ‘Very disturbing’: Trump receipt of overseas gifts unprecedented, experts warn

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      Former White House lawyers, diplomatic protocol officers and foreign affairs experts have told the Guardian that Donald Trump’s receipt of overseas gifts and targeted investments are “unprecedented”, as the White House remakes US foreign policy under a pay-for-access code that eclipses past administrations with characteristic Trumpian excess.The openness to foreign largesse was on full display this week as the US president was feted in the Gulf states during his first major diplomatic trip abroad this term, inking deals he claimed were worth trillions of dollars and pumping local leaders for investments as he says he remakes US foreign policy to prioritise “America first” – putting aside concerns of human rights or international law for the bottom line of American businesses and taxpayers.But quite often, the bottom line also has benefited Trump himself. His family’s wealth has ballooned by more than $3bn, according to press estimates, and the reported benefits from cryptocurrencies and other investment deals such as plans for new Trump-branded family properties may be far larger. Deals for billions more have been inked by business associates close to Trump, meaning that their political support for the White House can translate into lucrative contracts abroad.“When we’re negotiating with other countries, the concern is that our negotiating position will change if someone does a favor or delivers a gift to the president of the United States,” Richard Painter, the chief White House ethics lawyer in the administration of George W Bush, said.“Whether it’s trying to resolve the Russia-Ukraine war, or the Middle East or anything else. You know the the impression is given that the position of the United States can be swayed and even bought.”Others argue that the message being sent by the White House is that American foreign policy is being sold to the highest bidder.View image in fullscreen“Trump has put a for-sale sign out front of the White House,” said Norm Eisen, the executive director of the legal advocacy group State Democracy Defenders Fund and a White House “ethics czar” and ambassador to the Czech Republic under Barack Obama. “Of course you’re going to see Qatar and UAE as like a bidding war. Qatar says: ‘I’ll give you a $400m plane,’ and the UAE says: ‘Hold my beer, I’ll give your crypto company $2bn.’”In a particularly eye-catching incident this week, Qatar offered to give the US Department of Defense a $400m Boeing 747-8 that Trump had suggested could be used as Air Force One and then passed on to his presidential library after he leaves office.The plane has become a lightning rod among US Democrats, and critics have argued it violates the emoluments clause of the constitution that prohibits the president from receiving gifts from foreign entities.Trump had called the plane a “great gesture” from Qatar and said that it would be “stupid” for him not to accept the gift. A Democratic lawmaker had called the plane a “flying palace”, and even diehard Maga supporters such as the commentators Laura Loomer and Ben Shapiro have criticised it publicly.Painter suggested that it would be similar to King George III gifting George Washington a copy of the royal stagecoach for his use in office. “You think the founders wouldn’t have considered that a bribe?” he said.But Gulf states have offered other incentives, including a $2bn investment from a UAE-controlled funds into a Trump-linked stablecoin that could incentivise the president to shape foreign policy in favour of Abu Dhabi.An advisory sent to congressional Democrats this week and seen by the Guardian said: “President Trump and the Trump family have moved at breakneck speed to profit from a massive crypto scam on the American people.”The gifts, and in particular the potential gift of a jet, have led to a series of denunciations on Capitol Hill as they seek to build momentum for a legislative push.“This isn’t America first. This is not what he promised the American people. This is Trump first,” said Chris Murphy, a Democratic senator from Connecticut. “He is willing to put our nation’s security at risk, take unconstitutional bribes, just so he can fly himself and his Mar-a-Lago golf buddies around the world in gold-plated luxury planes gifted to him by foreign governments.”But is it illegal? As Qatar would give the jet to the Department of Defense, some experts have said that it may not directly violate the emoluments clause or other laws, even if Trump were to make use of the plane while in office.“Never seen it before,” said Scott Amey, the general counsel of the Project On Government Oversight, a non-profit government watchdog group based in Washington. “Is it allowed? I’m still uncertain.”Past administrations would have run from the perceived conflicts of interest being welcomed by Trump. The former White House ethics advisers described crises such as when a Gulf state tried to present a Rolex to a national security adviser, or when the Boston Red Sox tried to gift the White House chief of staff a baseball bat signed by all the players (the addressee was forced to pay its estimated market value, said Painter). Eisen said that he forbade Obama from even refinancing the mortgage on his house in Chicago because of his capacities to influence the market.“The status quo has been saying no, because it’s an actual and apparent conflict of interest, and it could jeopardize our domestic and foreign policies,” said Amey. ”It certainly doesn’t pass the sniff test for a lot of Americans.”The lavish gifts and other investments come as Trump is reshaping America’s policy in the Middle East, skipping Israel and turning toward the Gulf states in a flurry of deal-making that could benefit both sides handsomely. And Trump’s family and other advisers, such as Steve Witkoff, with interests in the Gulf states are closely involved.View image in fullscreen“When the first Trump administration came in, I saw that people in the Gulf said, ‘Finally, an American administration we understand. He sends us his son-in-law to talk to us,’” said Dr F Gregory Gause III of the Middle East Institute, a former professor of international affairs at the Bush School. “It’s a startling change in American norms … the notion that Trump family private business and US government business walk hand in hand is remarkable.”While potential gifts like a jet cannot be hidden, the potential to move billions of dollars in cryptocurrency secretly has watchdogs, the political opposition and other foreign observers deeply concerned. “We’re talking about billions of dollars, almost infinite money, that can be paid by anyone,” said one senior European diplomat. One little-known China-linked firm with no revenue last year bought $300m of a Trump meme coin this week, raising further concerns of dark foreign money moving into US politics.Senate Democrats have called for rewriting the Genius Act, Trump-backed legislation that they say would provide for far-too-lax regulation of so-called stablecoins, in order to ban him from benefiting. “If Congress is going to supercharge the use of stablecoins and other cryptocurrencies, it must include safeguards that make it harder for criminals, terrorists, and foreign adversaries to exploit the financial system and put our national security at risk,” said the memo.The flood of foreign money has left former officials who used to carefully track the giving of gifts and other goods from foreign government infuriated.The rules can be “annoying and sort of stupid, but it is what separates the good guys from the bad guys, as it relates to corruption and good governance”, said Rufus Gifford, a former head of protocol for the state department, which also tracks gifts to US officials from foreign governments. “And I think that Trump just has no respect for those institutions that have been set up for a very specific purpose, which is to root out corruption.“It is very, very disturbing that a president of the United States could be in a position to profit off the office in which he holds,” he continued. “And that is, again, something that is never supposed to be able to happen. And it’s really quite extraordinary.” More

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      US and Saudi Arabia sign $142bn arms deal as Trump to meet Syrian leader

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      The United States and Saudi Arabia have signed a $142bn arms deal touted by the White House as the “largest defence sales agreement in history” in the first stop of Donald Trump’s four-day diplomatic tour to the Gulf states aimed at securing big deals and spotlighting the benefits of Trump’s transactional foreign policy.During the trip, the White House also confirmed that Trump would meet with Syria’s new leader, Ahmed al-Sharaa, the former rebel commander whose forces helped overthrow Bashar al-Assad in 2024. The informal meeting will be the first face-to-face meeting between a US president and a Syrian leader since 2000, when Bill Clinton met with the late leader Hafez al-Assad in Geneva.Speaking at an investment forum on Tuesday, Trump said that he planned to lift sanctions on Syria after holding talks with Saudi Arabia’s Mohammed bin Salman and Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. “I will be ordering the cessation of sanctions against Syria in order to give them a chance at greatness,” Trump said.Sharaa’s pitch to woo the US president offered access to Syrian oil, reconstruction contracts and to build a Trump Tower in Damascus in exchange for the lifting of US sanctions on Syria.Though the details of the sanctions relief were still unclear, Sharaa’s team in Damascus was celebrating. “This is amazing, it worked,” said Radwan Ziadeh, a Syrian writer and activist who is close to the Syrian president. He shared a picture of an initial mockup of Trump Tower Damascus. “This is how you win his heart and mind,” he said, noting that Sharaa would probably show Trump the design during their meeting in Riyadh on Wednesday.The visit was heavily focused on business interests and securing quick wins – often with characteristic Trumpian embellishment – for the administration. Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed pledged to invest $600bn in the United States during a lunch with Trump, including $20bn in artificial intelligence data centres, purchases of gas turbines and other energy equipment worth $14.2bn, nearly $5bn in Boeing 737-8 jets, and other deals.But details of the specific commitments remained vague, the numbers put out by the White House did not total $600bn, and some of the programs began under Joe Biden’s administration.The White House called the arms deal the “largest defence sales agreement in history” and said that it included plans for more than a dozen US defense companies to sell weapons, equipment and services in the areas of air force advancement and space capabilities, air and missile defense, as well as border and maritime security.The US president was feted with a royal guard as he arrived in Riyadh on Tuesday. Royal Saudi Air Force F-15s escorted Trump’s Air Force One jet as it arrived in Riyadh and Trump sat with Salman in an ornate hall at the Royal Court at Al Yamamah Palace with members of the US and Saudi and business elite. Among them were Elon Musk, prominent figures in AI such as Sam Altman, as well the chief executives of IBM, BlackRock, Citigroup, Palantir and Nvidia, among others.When Salman pledged that Saudi Arabia would invest $600bn in the US economy, Trump smiled and joked that it should be $1tn.The trip is part of a reordering of Middle Eastern politics dominated by Trump’s “America first” platform of prioritising domestic US economic and security interests over foreign alliances and international law. Critics have said that the dealmaking empowers Trump and a coterie of businessmen around the president, and the US president’s family has business interests in Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar, giving this administration an unprecedented conflict of interest.The most glaring example of the new commoditisation of American foreign policy under Trump has been the proposed gift from the ruling family of Qatar of a luxury Boeing 747-8 jumbo jet that the White House said could be converted into a presidential plane and then be given to Trump’s presidential library after he leaves office.The gift has provoked anger from congressional Democrats, one of whom described it as an “aerial palace” and said it would constitute “the most valuable gift ever conferred on a president by a foreign government”.Trump has defended the offer, saying in a post it would “replace the 40 year old Air Force One, temporarily, in a very public and transparent transaction” and called Democrats asking for an ethics investigation “World Class Losers!!!”The meeting between Trump and Salman was characterised by smiles and friendly backslapping, a sharp contrast to past summits when the Saudi leader was mired in controversy over the 2018 murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.While his administration touted big deals, Trump also admitted that his geopolitical goals of Saudi Arabia’s diplomatic recognition of Israel would take time due in large part to the Israel’s prosecution of the war in Gaza.“It will be a special day in the Middle East, with the whole world watching, when Saudi Arabia joins us” in the Abraham accords, the Trump administration’s framework for Arab states to recognise Israel, he said. “And I really think it’s going to be something special – but you’ll do it in your own time.”Trump is also due to visit the United Arab Emirates on Thursday before continuing on to Qatar this week.His negotiations in the region have been characterised by big-ticket investment deals, and those appeared to play a role in his reversal of US policy on Syria as well.Sharaa, who is keen to normalise relations with the US, has reportedly offered Trump a number of sweeteners including the Trump tower in Damascus, a demilitarised zone by the Golan Heights that would strengthen Israel’s claim to the territory it has occupied since 1967, diplomatic recognition of Israel, and a profit-sharing deal on resources similar to the Ukraine minerals deal.The idea to offer Trump a piece of real estate with his name on it in the heart of Damascus was thought up by a US Republican senator, who passed on the idea to Sharaa’s team.“Sanctions in Syria are very complicated, but with Trump, he can [get] most of them lifted. It is a great opportunity,” Ziadeh said.The trip is also extraordinary for Trump’s decision not to visit Israel, the US’s closest ally in the region, due to the war in Gaza and Trump’s fraught relationship with Benjamin Netanyahu. Hamas released the last remaining American hostage, Edan Alexander, on the eve of Trump’s visit to the Middle East, in an effort to push Trump to pressure Netanyahu to end the war.Netanyahu doubled down on the war on Tuesday in a show of defiance, saying that any ceasefire would only be “temporary”.“In the coming days, we will enter with full force to complete the operation to defeat Hamas,” he said. “Our forces are there now.”“There will be no situation where we stop the war,” he added. More

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      Trump’s border intimidation is coming for US citizens too – ask streamer Hasan Piker | Owen Jones

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      Where are all the free speech warriors on the right now? Hasan Piker, a popular streamer with 4.5 million followers across YouTube and Twitch, who has been hailed by mainstream publications such as the New Yorker and New York Times as the left’s answer to the deluge of rightwing internet influencers, says he was detained and questioned for hours by border control agents as he re-entered the US (Piker is a US citizen). It is an instructive moment. Countries that behave like this towards political commentators and dissenting voices who are their own citizens are either nakedly authoritarian, or well on the way.Piker was reportedly interrogated at length not just about Hamas, the Houthis and Hezbollah, but his views on Donald Trump. The 33-year-old pundit – an unapologetic champion of the Palestinian cause – stuck to a message of opposing “endless bloodshed” and siding with civilians. That the biggest progressive streamer in the US was subjected to this experience is emblematic of a phenomenon that requires an accurate and insistent description: it is the biggest assault on free speech in the west since the height of McCarthyism seven decades ago.When foreign-born citizens – including green card holders – began to be detained by US authorities over their opposition to Israel’s genocide, it should have been clear that this was just phase one: US citizens would be next. Sure, Piker wasn’t arrested, but the authorities are pushing the boundaries bit by bit. The numbers of foreign visitors entering the US are falling as it is, undoubtedly driven by fears of a punitive border regime. But Piker’s detention sends a message to Americans with dissenting opinions – not least opponents of Israel’s genocide. The threat of being stopped at the border and subjected to lengthy interrogation simply because of what you think is straightforward political intimidation. It won’t stop there.That the vice-president, JD Vance, railed against Europe for a supposed war on free speech underlines what a sham this favoured narrative of the right always was. Weeks later, his boss announced that universities allowing “illegal” protests would be starved of federal cash – with Columbia University losing $400m despite having clamped down on pro-Palestinian protests – and dissenting students would be variously expelled, arrested, imprisoned or deported. Alas, it was under the Biden administration that the McCarthyite blacklisting-style campaign began, with defenders of Palestinian rights being variously deplatformed, fired and threatened.Indeed, Vance could have noted how European countries such as Germany have assaulted free speech by silencing pro-Palestinian activists: from imposing crippling restrictions on protests and violently assaulting demonstrators to shutting down conferences, sacking people who speak out and now seeking to deport activists, too. Alas, it’s not really free speech that Vance is interested in, but rather advancing far-right politics.If we’re going to discuss who is being stopped at the border, let’s discuss the astonishing 23,380 US citizens who serve in the IDF, according to figures quoted in the Washington Post a year ago. Many of them are undoubtedly committing unspeakable war crimes in Israel’s genocidal onslaught. Yet they are being waved through the border. And that really sums it up. If like Piker, you speak out against genocide, you are liable to be treated as a criminal as you enter your own country. If you’re a US citizen serving in a foreign army committing heinous atrocities, you’re more likely to be treated as a hero. The world is turned on its head.

      Owen Jones is a Guardian columnist

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      ‘Just wildly illegal’: top Democrats push to censure Trump’s plan to accept Qatar jet

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      Top Democrats in the US Senate are pushing for a vote on the floor of the chamber censuring Donald Trump’s reported plan to accept a $400m luxury jet from the royal family of Qatar for use as Air Force One and later as a fixture in the Trump’s personal presidential library.Four Democratic members of the Senate foreign relations committee said on Monday that they would press for a vote later this week. They said that elected officials, including the president, were not allowed to accept large gifts from foreign governments unless authorized to do so by Congress.Cory Booker from New Jersey, Brian Schatz from Hawaii, Chris Coons from Delaware and Chris Murphy from Connecticut cast the reported gift of the Boeing 747-8 jumbo jet as a clear conflict of interest and a serious threat to national security.“Air Force Once is more than just a plane – it’s a symbol of the presidency and of the United States itself,” the senators said in a joint statement. “No one should use public service for personal gain through foreign gifts.”News of a possible gift of the luxury jet prompted immediate scathing criticism from senior Democrats. Though the Qatari government has stressed that no final decision has yet been made, Trump appeared to confirm it on Sunday when he commented on social media that the transfer was being made “in a very public and transparent transaction”.The plan appears to be for the 13-year-old plane to be fitted out by the US military for use as Air Force One and then, when Trump leaves the White House, for it to be put on display in his presidential library – in effect being handed to Trump for his own personal use.The reported arrangement comes as Trump sets off for a tour of the Middle East, including Qatar. Another of the countries on the tour, the United Arab Emirates, has also become embroiled in controversy over potential conflicts of interest involving Trump.Last week it was revealed that an investment firm based in Abu Dhabi had injected $2bn into a stablecoin venture launched by Trump’s World Liberty Financial crypto company as an investment into the crypto exchange Binance.Senate Democrats are also gearing up to challenge Trump’s conflicts of interest under congressional rules governing the sale of military weapons to foreign countries.Murphy, the senator from Connecticut who has been at the forefront of sounding the alarm over conflicts of interest in the second Trump administration, has said he will use his powers to challenge arms sales as a way of forcing a full debate and Senate vote on both the Qatar plane and UAE stablecoin issues.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionHe said on social media that he would object to “any military deal with a nation that is paying off Trump personally – we can’t act like this is normal foreign policy”.He added: “UAE’s investment in Trump crypto and Qatar’s gifting of a plane is nuclear grade graft.”In an earlier post on Bluesky, Murphy described the idea of Qatar handing over the jet as being “just wildly illegal”.Trump has so far brushed aside the Democratic fury. He praised Qatar’s offer on Monday as a “great gesture” and said he would “never be one to turn down that kind of offer”. More

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      Trump’s dangerous projects follow a predictable pattern

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      Soon after Elon Musk slapped the air with a double Nazi salute, his brother Kimbal went on X to say: “This is what success feels like.” And three months ago, he seemed to have a point.The Trump administration, which appeared to have been co-led for a time by big brother Musk, is now in a period of retrenchment. Initiatives focused on Gaza, tariffs, spending, deporting millions of migrantand “government efficiency” have all deflated somewhat.We are admittedly only a small fraction of the way through this second Trump term, but a pattern appears to be emerging: the president proclaims a big policy goal, Maga appointees scramble to interpret his objectives, and then the whole thing is abandoned in paroxysm. Which isn’t to say that real harm isn’t being caused – just less than might otherwise be.First, the Gaza riviera. Trump’s response to the genocide in Palestine was to envision a grand ethnic cleansing embellished by Carrara marble and rickrack. Questions the president didn’t seem to have asked in advance: where would the Palestinians go? Why would Egypt or Jordan risk regime-ending instability? Who would pay for it all? Faced with the difficulty of implementing a complex plan,which only 3% of Israeli Jews regard as immoral, Trump retreated.But not before facilitating harm. His explicit endorsement of the majority view in Israel that Palestinian residents of Gaza should relocate has only permitted the leadership in that country to accelerate their Biden-era policy. Now, Israel Katz, the Israeli defense minister, openly speaks of using starvation as a tool in Gaza, something the Israelis were shy about admitting only seven months ago. And since Benjamin Netanyahu’s government broke the ceasefire with Hamas in March, Israeli troops have murdered more than 2,100 Palestinians – the majority of them children. Again, an extension of the Biden policy, but without the chintzy gilt.The tariff debacle, meanwhile, showcased the administration’s inability to shoot straight. A Forbes analysis counts nine flip-flops on tariff policy. Bad policy is bad – whiplash makes it worse.One of the arguments explaining the dollar’s status as the world’s reserve currency – the tender most countries use for trade and global finance – is that the US is a big and stable country that pays its bills and honors its commitments. That trust in America’s ability to manage an economy confers lots of benefits to Americans, such as lower borrowing and transaction expenses. Demand for the US dollar allows the US to finance deficits, seemingly indefinitely.But there are signs that the erratic tariff policy has caused other countries – who buy US debt – to question old assumptions about stability and growth. It turns out that, like addressing Palestine, trade policy is hard.But it didn’t have to be like this – a measured tariff policy could have helped enhance American industry. Coupled with prohibitions on stock buybacks – a Reagan-era concession to corruption that allows CEOs to inflate their stock prices and “performance” bonuses – a sensible tariff policy could have helped facilitate the investment of corporate profits domestically, reinvigorating the labor movement to produce better jobs. But policy requires a clear statement of goals and an understanding of how to get there – neither of which the Trump administration was able to articulate. Economic growth has almost certainly been dented by the bizarre trade war and myriad reversals – so we’ll probably see more deficit spending at higher borrowing rates.And then there’s Yemen, where the Houthi government has harassed Israeli-affiliated boats in response to the genocide. The catastrophic effort to bomb the Yemenis into submission, again, an extension of Joe Biden’s Israel policy, was preceded with bluster. In March, Trump issued a message on his website that read, “To all Houthi terrorists, YOUR TIME IS UP, AND YOUR ATTACKS MUST STOP, STARTING TODAY. IF THEY DON’T, HELL WILL RAIN DOWN UPON YOU LIKE NOTHING YOU HAVE EVER SEEN BEFORE!”But nearly two months into America’s bombing campaign, which has killed hundreds in Yemen at vast expense, the effort to open trade routes in the Red Sea has resulted in a negotiated detente which falls far short of achieving Trump’s goals. The deal commits the Yemenis to leaving American ships alone, but says nothing about Israeli-affiliated vessels. The Wall Street Journal reports that the deal took the Israelis by surprise.Meanwhile, Elon Musk’s “department of government efficiency” (Doge) dramatically overestimated its potential and overstated its accomplishments: at a meeting last month, Musk said he expected Doge cuts would save $150bn, or 85% less than the promised $1tn. Now Musk is returning to Tesla – whose weak quarterly results have caused the stock price to crash back to earth.All of it a bad joke, played on the American people.Trump’s inability to follow through on his big initiatives is probably attributable to lots of things, but the quality of the man, and the people around him, stick out. Pete Hesgeth, the secretary of defense, appears unfocused and unbalanced in interviews. Kristi Noem, head of the US Department of Homeland Security, seems obsessed with pageantry and appearances, while the attorney general, Pam Bondi, exhibits sycophantic tendencies. Marco Rubio, the secretary of state, and JD Vance spent a lot of time explaining how dangerous Trump was – Vance compared Trump to Hitler – before joining his administration. All seem to have been hired for their ability to flatter and prostrate themselves, which is not the same as competence or executive experience.So now, a bigger picture is emerging. The operating moral principle directing the Trump presidency seems to be that people are generally worse than they proclaim to be. And the president has gone out of his way to hire people with limited talent and ability, whose main qualification is Maga, people who can’t follow through on big pronouncements and goals. It is indeed government by the worst.

      Ahmed Moor is a writer and fellow at the Foundation for Middle East Peace More

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      China and US agree 90-day pause to trade war initiated by Donald Trump

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      China and the US have agreed a 90-day pause to the deepening trade war that has threatened to upend the global economy, with reciprocal tariffs to be lowered by 115%.Speaking to the media after talks in Geneva, the US treasury secretary, Scott Bessent, said both sides had shown “great respect” in the negotiations.Bessent said: “The consensus from both delegations this weekend was neither side wants a decoupling.”The 90-day lowering of tariffs applies to the duties announced by Donald Trump on 2 April, which ultimately escalated to 125% on Chinese imports, with Beijing responding with equivalent measures.China also imposed non-tariff measures, such as restricting the export of critical minerals that are essential to US manufacturing of hi-tech goods.The US trade representative, Jamieson Greer, said China’s retaliation had been disproportionate and amounted to an effective embargo on trade between the world’s two biggest economies.With the 115% deduction, Chinese duties on US goods will be lowered to 10%, while the US tax on Chinese goods will be lowered to 30%. That is because the US tariffs include a 20% rate imposed by Trump before the latest trade war, which the president said was related to China’s role in the US’s fentanyl crisis. The fentanyl-related tariff will still apply.A spokesperson for China’s ministry of commerce said: “This move meets the expectations of producers and consumers in both countries, as well as the interests of both nations and the common interest of the world.“We hope that the US side will, based on this meeting, continue to move forward in the same direction with China, completely correct the erroneous practice of unilateral tariff hikes, and continually strengthen mutually beneficial cooperation.”China’s yuan jumped to a six-month high on the signal that the trade war would be paused. Up to 16m jobs were at risk in China, according to some estimates, while the US faced rising inflation and empty shelves thanks to dizzying tariffs on the biggest supplier of US goods.Bessent said he was impressed by the level of Chinese engagement on the fentanyl issue during the talks in Switzerland. “For the first time the Chinese side understood the magnitude of what is happening in the US,” Bessent said.A joint statement published by the US and China on Monday said that both sides would “continue to advance related work in a spirit of mutual openness, continuous communication, cooperation and mutual respect”.William Xin, the chair of the hedge fund Spring Mountain Pu Jiang Investment Management, told Reuters: “The result far exceeds market expectations. Previously, the hope was just that the two sides can sit down to talk, and the market had been very fragile. Now, there’s more certainty. Both China stocks and the yuan will be in an upswing for a while.”skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionHu Xijin, the former editor of the nationalist Chinese tabloid the Global Times, said on social media the agreement was a “great victory for China in upholding the principles of equality and mutual respect”. Hu noted on Weibo that the recently agreed UK-US trade deal maintained the US’s 10% tariff on UK imports, “while the UK did not implement reciprocal measures”.Wang Wen, the head of the Chongyang Institute for Financial Studies at Renmin University in Beijing, said: “This is an unexpected achievement in Sino-US tariff negotiations.”However, Wang also urged caution, as he said the agreement “does not represent the resolution of the structural contradictions between China and the United States, nor does it mean that there will be no friction and serious differences between China and the United States in the future”.Stock markets across Europe rose in the aftermath of the US-China announcement. Germany’s DAX index jumped by 1.5%, with Mercedes-Benz, Daimler Trucks and BMW among the biggest risers. France’s CAC index rose by 1.2%.Additional research by Lillian Yang More