(Bloomberg) -- JPMorgan Chase & Co (NYSE:JPM). Chief Executive Officer Jamie Dimon put the odds of the U.S. and China reaching a trade deal at 80 percent, sounding a note of optimism even after the rising specter of tariffs roiled global markets.
Despite the recent increase in tensions between the sides, the bank chief said in an interview with Bloomberg Television that it remains probable that there will eventually be an agreement. He said, however, that global growth would be hit if the talks go “really south.”
“Now we have this whole kind of little bump in the road,” said Dimon. “Sometimes his tweets don’t pan out to be as bad. I don’t think they’ll get the deal done by Friday.”
U.S. President Donald Trump threatened to raise tariffs on Chinese goods starting Friday. China’s Vice Premier Liu He will meet with U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, on May 9 and 10, according to a statement Tuesday on the Chinese Ministry of Commerce website.
China has already opened many industries, Dimon said on the sidelines of JPMorgan’s annual China summit in Beijing, something that’s in the country’s own interests. The U.S. bank recently received approval to take a majority stake in an onshore securities venture.
The outlook for the trade talks was cast into doubt after Trump’s surprise announcement over Twitter on Sunday that he planned to raise the tariff increase from the current 10 percent because talks were moving too slowly. The president said he may also impose duties “shortly” on $325 billion of Chinese goods that aren’t currently covered, a move that would hit virtually all imports from the Asian nation.
