Trump tweets after Xi Jinping meeting give global stock markets boost

Donald Trump and Xi Jinping have agreed a 90-day respite from from the two countries’ spat over trade tariffs, causing Wall Street to jump as it opened and giving global stock markets a shot in the arm overnight.

In customary fashion, Trump took to Twitter after a two-and-a-half hour dinner between the Chinese and US leaders in Buenos Aires to hail the meeting “extraordinary”, saying two countries’ relations had taken “a BIG leap forward”.

The Dow Jones industrial average jumped by 1.58 per cent in early trading, after Trump announced Beijing had agreed to “reduce and remove” the crippling 40 per cent on US car imports which contributed to General Motors announcing that it would cut nearly 15,000 jobs last week.

The S&P 500 index is up 1.3 per cent, while the Nasdaq has seen a 1.27 per cent boost.

London’s FTSE 100 index rose more than 2 per cent before stabilising at around 1.5 per cent up, while the Dax in Germany jumped 2.6 per cent this morning.

In Asia, Tokyo closed 1 per cent up, while the Shanghai Composite index led the way with a 2.57 per cent rise, while Hong Kong was up the same percentage. Australia’s ASX200 index closed 1.8 per cent better off.

Meanwhile spot gold rose more than 1 per cent to $1,233.03 per ounce this afternoon, its highest level since early November, while crude oil climbed more than 5 per cent.

Companies across industry also saw share prices rise today, with Apple up 2.07 per cent and General Motors up 2.48 per cent.

At the Argentina dinner, which followed this weekend’s G20 summit, Trump said he would hold off on boosting tariffs on £157bn of Chinese goods from 10 per cent to 25 per cent in the new year.

Farmers would be a “BIG and FAST beneficiary” of the new agreement, he added, with China intending to start purchasing US agricultural product “immediately”.

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi told reporters the agreement had “prevented further expansion of economic friction between the two countries”, but Beijing has not thus far been drawn on Trump’s claim on car tariffs.