President Donald Trump said he "pretty much" completed a trade deal with South Korea on his weeklong Asia trip, before heading into more trade talks with China’s President Xi Jinping.
"We made our deal, pretty much finalized it," Trump said Oct. 29 at a dinner with South Korea’s President Lee Jae Myung and other regional leaders. In response to a question, he also said: "We came to a conclusion on a lot of very different items."
The two countries had unveiled a trade deal in July in which South Korea offered to invest $350 billion into the United States, in exchange for a lower tariff rate of 15%. Trump announced the deal July 30 on social media as "a Full and Complete Trade Deal."
But the countries deadlocked for months about the structure of those investments.
"Prospects were not bright even last night, and there was dramatic progress on the day," Kim Yong-beom, South Korea's top presidential policy chief, told reporters, without providing further details.
