Treasury Secretary Bessent Expects Trade Deals Before 90-Day Pause Ends

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on Friday said that he expects trade deals to be made before President Donald Trump’s 90-day tariff pause ends.

In an interview with Fox Business, Bessent said that most of the U.S.'s trading partners have been negotiating in “very good faith.”

“These deals are moving quickly, and I think as we approach the end of the 90-day period, we’re going to see more and more of them announced,” Bessent said.

However, he called out the European Union as an exception – this comes after President Trump threatened to slap the bloc with a 50% tariff beginning June 1.

Trump said that discussions with the EU are “going nowhere” as he sought to put pressure on the bloc to make a better offer.

“I think this is in response just to the EU’s pace. I would hope that this would light a fire under the EU,” said Bessent.

The Treasury Secretary said most Asian trading partners have come up with “very good deals,” while adding that negotiations with India are “far along.”

As for Trump’s threat to slap Apple Inc. with 25% tariffs if it does not manufacture iPhones in the U.S., Bessent explained that the President intends to bring precision manufacturing to the country.

He said that one of the vulnerabilities of the U.S. is external manufacturing, more so in semiconductors, and that’s where Apple comes in. “A large part of Apple's components are in semiconductors, so we would like to have Apple help us make the semiconductor supply chain more secure,” he said.

Bessent underlined that the Trump administration has 18 more trade deals to wrap up.

Meanwhile, the SPDR S&P 500 ETF (SPY), which represents the S&P 500 index, was down 0.84% at the time of writing.

For updates and corrections, email newsroom[at]stocktwits[dot]com.

Also See: Fed’s Collins Says No Rate Cut In 2025 Is A Possibility, Points To Rising Uncertainty Due To Trump’s Tariff War