Coronavirus will have no ‘material impact’ on US-China trade deal, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin says

US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin conceded that while China was focused on the virus, Washington still expects Beijing to live up to its commitments

He acknowledged the outbreak could also delay the start of negotiations on deepening the trade deal with Beijing and reaching a phase two agreement

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China and the United States signed the phase one trade deal in January. Photo: DPA

Published: 6:37pm, 24 Feb 2020Updated: 6:37pm, 24 Feb 2020

US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said he does not expect the coronavirus outbreak to have a material impact on the phase one US-China trade deal, although that could change as more data becomes available in coming weeks.

Finance officials from the world’s 20 largest economies said on Sunday they would keep a close watch on the fast-spreading coronavirus outbreak, but stopped short of identifying it as downside risk to the global economy.

Fears of a coronavirus pandemic mounted even as the finance officials met in the Saudi Arabian capital of Riyadh, with sharp rises in new cases reported in Iran, Italy and South Korea.

Mnuchin, in an interview with Reuters late on Sunday, cautioned against jumping to conclusions about the impact of what he called a “human tragedy” on the global economy, or on companies’ supply chain decisions, saying it was simply too soon to know.

I don’t expect that this will have any ramifications on phase one. Based on everything that we know, and where the virus is now, I don’t expect that it’s going to be material

Steven Mnuchin

China was focused on the virus for now, he said, but Washington still expected Beijing to live up to its commitments to buy more US products and services under the trade deal.