Thread: Is China playing Trump in the trade negotiations?

Is China playing Trump in the trade negotiations?

By John Crudele
December 17, 2018 | 10:35pm

It’s called “pretend and extend” by people who watched decades ago the negotiations taking place between the Japanese and the US.

Now, some people are wondering if that’s what the Chinese are doing to Trump in the two countries’ trade talks.

Stock prices fell Monday — a typical reaction to news of progress in the talks. That news came in the form of a Wall Street Journal story that said Beijing is planning to change a policy called Made in China 2025 to be more accommodative to foreign goods.

2025! That’s one, two, three … more than six years away. More importantly, it’s the first year that Trump won’t be president — if he wins re-election.

Are the Chinese playing “pretend and extend?” Is Trump being snookered? Is the stock market losing its mind?

Stocks keeps falling and the experts are worried. December is supposed to be a rally month as professional money managers rig the market so they look better to clients at the end of the year.

But what’s the most ominous sign for the market? The fact that people I’ve known for a long time are standing around at Christmas parties discussing how Wall Street is killing their 401(k)s. If average people get frightened and start selling stocks, this is going to be ugly.

https://nypost.com/2018/12/17/is-chi...-negotiations/

No I don't think Trump is being snookered, Wall Street was nervous Friday with the news of asbestos in Johnson & Johnson Baby Powder, the 500 point loss on Friday was all due to the sales of J&J stock. Today, the 500 drop is pre-selling before the Feds are expected to raise the rates.

Will probably sell off a little more tomorrow to have funds ready to reinvest in higher yield bonds if the bond rate goes up, which it might. Feds might do the right thing and leave rates alone for now while we fight for better trade deals, that would be proper and smart, but story is the Fed wants to show its "independence" and do one more hike and then stop for awhile. Sure, take one more pill and kill yourselves. Dumb! I hope they do the right thing and do nothing with interest rates until we get through the China trade deal, the North Korea Summit II, and Russia Summit II.

We'll see what happens. Never a dull moment!!