WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The United States will make several trade announcements in the next 48 hours, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said on Monday, ahead of a U.S. deadline on Wednesday to finalize trade pacts.
“We’ve had a lot of people change their tune in terms of negotiations. So my mailbox was full last night with a lot of new offers, a lot of new proposals,” Bessent said in an interview with CNBC. “So it’s going to be a busy couple of days.”
President Donald Trump said the United States would start delivering tariff letters from 12:00 pm ET (1600 GMT) on Monday.
The letters would not necessarily provide an ultimatum, according to Bessent.
“It’s just ‘thank you for wanting to trade with the United States of America. We welcome you as a trading partner, and here’s the rate, unless you want to come back and try to negotiate,’” he said.
Bessent declined to comment on whether negotiations on new ownership of the TikTok short video app, which President Donald Trump said would start this week, would be linked to trade talks.
He said he would meet with his Chinese counterpart in the next couple of weeks.
“I think there are things for us to do together if the Chinese want to do it, so we will discuss whether we are able to move beyond trade into other areas,” he told CNBC.
(Reporting by Susan Heavey and Doina Chiacu; Editing by Katharine Jackson and Bernadette Baum)
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