I guess the suspension of non-tariff countermeasures could be seen as a capitulation and potentially a sign of quietly rolling back the export control of REM except I'm pretty sure those have been in place for a while. If we take this literally, it seems most likely rolling back the Unreliable Entity List and some regulatory investigations? I mean this tariff stuff is basically a reset back to April 1, but it's not like this started on just April 2. Remember the whole Canada, Mexico, China stuff before this?
I fail to see how this is a capitulation in any way unless you believed the 4d go narrative that China was going to usher in the new global economic order. The official White House statement seems very reciprocal. It's just people cherrypicking which tariffs to talk about. We might as well say that US still has 100% tariffs on Chinese EVs so it's actually a complete surrender. The 30% vs 10% is just spin from a group who want to be seen as WINNING! China basically got what it claimed it wanted before talks would start, a complete cancellation of Liberation Day tariffs besides the 10% for both sides. I think it's fair to claim that there wouldn't be anything too big as what ended up happening is raising tariffs on each other over the course of a couple days and then reversing all of it in a weekend. It's not like this was particularly serious since it started with Trump unilaterally deciding to nuke trade with everyone. I don't think it's unreasonable to tell people to be prepared to fight because there is nothing wrong with taking him seriously when he said he wanted to decouple trade.
Also let's review what Trump's goals were for these tariffs in the first place:
1. Reshore manufacturing - Stated goal
2. Refinancing debt - Speculation based off his first blink as well as attacks on Powell
3. 4d Chess China Isolation - Claimed after the retaliation and 90-day 10% pause on the rest of the world
4. Stock Market Manipulation - Based off the constant schizo headlines
So, of these potential goals, which of them are the actual intended plan? It's definitely not 1. Could be 2 but rate cut doesn't seem to be coming, and yield rates have not budged. Doesn't seem to be 3 either given what just happened. 4 basically already happened so yeah.
Also, let's remind ourselves that TikTok is still getting extensions with no deal in sight. This will probably happen with the tariff extensions. Trump's lauded MASSIVE trade deal with a BIG country ended up being a borderline meaningless one with the UK (I believe this is the only one signed so far in over a month, and I think India talks were going well before US MSM started shittalking them). Trump managed to hype and spin that as a massive victory as well as all the other random stuff he claims as his massive wins. The stock market will rally over fake headlines lol.
