Spanish Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Alvarez is posing in Madrid on September 14, 2025 with US Treasury Secretary Scott Bescent and US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer to continue debate on trade, economic and national security issues.
Spain’s Foreign Ministry of AFFA | Via Reuters
US and Chinese officials began talks in Madrid on Sunday over tense trade relations. There is a demand for the looming sale deadline of China’s short video app Tiktok and Washington, as well as the allies place tariffs on China by purchasing Russian oil.
US Treasury Secretary Scott Bescent and US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer arrived just before China’s deputy prime minister and China’s top trade negotiator Lee Chengan at Baroque Palacio de Santa Cruz, which houses Spanish foreign ministries in the Spanish capital.
The talks mark the fourth time in four months a delegation met in a European city to ensure that US-China trade relations that have been broken under President Donald Trump’s tariffs do not collapse.
The delegation last met in Stockholm in July and agreed to extend it for 90 days as a general rule. This significantly reduced triple-digit retaliation fees on both sides and resumed the flow of rare earth minerals from China to the US.
Trump has approved an extension of current US tariff charges for Chinese products, totaling around 55% until November 10th.
Trade experts said there is little chance of a significant breakthrough in the Spanish-sponsored consultations.
The most likely outcome of the Madrid talk is seen as another extension of the deadline for bytedance, the Chinese owner of the popular Tiktok app, to sell its US business by September 17, or face US closures.
Sources familiar with the Trump administration’s debate over Tiktok’s future said the deal was not expected, but the fourth deadline since Trump took office in January will be extended.
Trump launched his Tiktoc account last month.
Tiktok has not been discussed in previous rounds of US-China trade talks in Geneva, London and Stockholm. However, sources said the issue gives the Trump administration another expansion political cover, with public inclusion as an agenda item on the Treasury’s announcement of the Treasury talks.
Wendy Cutler, a former USTR trade negotiator and director of the Institute for Policy Research in Washington, said he expected a more substantial “delivery” to be saved later this year at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Summit in Seoul, possibly at the end of October.
These include the final agreement to resolve US national security concerns over Tiktok, as well as lifting restrictions on US soybean purchases, as well as reducing fentanyl-related tariffs on Chinese products, and the discussion in Madrid could help build land for such meetings, Cutler said.
But she said it would take years for China to move its economic model to domestic consumption and resolve US core economic complaints about China, including a demand that it not rely on national collateral exports.
“Frankly, I don’t think China is in a hurry to agree that it will not get substantial concessions on export controls and lower tariffs. “And unless there is any breakthrough in demand for China, I don’t see the US in a position to make big concessions to either.”
Russian hydraulics
The Treasury said the Madrid consultations also cover joint US and China efforts to combat money laundering.
Bescent on Friday urged a group of seven allies to impose “meaning tariffs” on imports from China and India, and pressured them to stop Russian oil purchases.
The G7 Finance Minister said on Friday that he had agreed to discuss such measures and accelerate the debate to use frozen Russian assets to help Ukraine’s defense.
Bessent and Greer said in a separate statement that G7 Allies should join the US to impose tariffs on Russian oil buyers. “A unified effort to fund Putin’s war machinery and cut funds will allow sufficient economic pressure to be applied to end the meaningless killing,” Bescent and Greer said, referring to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The US has imposed an extra 25% tariff on Indian goods than on Russian oil purchases, but so far it has refrained from impose such a punitive obligation on Chinese goods.
China’s Commerce Department says the Madrid consultations cover economic and trade issues such as US tariffs, “abuse” of export controls and tiktok.
Spain’s moment
Spanish Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Alvarez publicly greeted two delegations before the meeting began.
A source in the Spanish government said Spain’s choice for the latest round of “sensitivity” speeches is evidence that Madrid is integrating itself as a seat in strategic negotiations at a high level. Madrid has been trying to become the venue for the International Peace Conference to resolve the Israeli-Palestine conflict.
Sources said the Spanish government is using the event to strengthen bilateral ties with the US following a string of tense engagement with the Trump administration. Spain criticised Israeli attacks in Gaza and refused to commit to spending 5% of its budget on defense along with other NATO members.
Bescent himself also criticized Spain for declaring Beijing as a “strategic partner” during the height of Trump’s tariff attacks in April, saying that closer ties with the Asian giants are similar to “cutting your own throat.”
