WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump on Tuesday embraced a more positive tone in his ongoing trade dispute with China, soothing financial markets that had been roiled for days as the White House sent mixed signals about talks with Beijing.

U.S. trade officials spoke with Chinese leaders Tuesday about restarting trade talks, a move that came a week after Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping discussed the months-long tit-for-tat trade war over a steak dinner at the G-20.

China, meanwhile, is considering a plan to ease tariffs on U.S. autos from 40 percent to 15 percent, Bloomberg News reported Tuesday. Trump touted the movement in a morning Twitter post, promising that "important announcements" would come from the "productive conversations."

Though the decision by China on autos was in flux and talks appeared to be tentative, markets reacted with confidence after a week of losses brought on by the trade dispute.

Stocks opened higher on Tuesday with the Dow initially jumping more than 300 points. In early trading, the Dow Jones industrial average rose 273 points, or 1.1 percent, to 24,696. The Standard & Poor’s 500 index increased 1.2 percent, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq added 1.3 percent.

Many U.S. autos sold in China are made overseas. In 2017, the U.S. exported $10.2 billion in new and used passenger cars to China, according to the Commerce Department.

“The tariff cut is encouraging,” said Scott Paul, president of the Alliance for American Manufacturing. “I’ll be more persuaded when we also see some non-tariff barriers knocked down."

Markets initially reacted positively to Trump's meeting with Xi in Buenos Aires as the U.S. indicated it had agreed to hold off on new tariffs for 90 days. But that optimism was quickly dashed after the White House and Beijing sent mixed signals about what, specifically, had been settled during the meeting.

Concerns that tensions in the trade war could resurface have mounted since the arrest of Meng Wanzhou, chief financial officer of Huawei Technologies, whom the U.S. accuses of attempting to circumvent U.S. sanctions on Iran. China has strongly protested Wanzhous' arrest and possible extradition to the U.S.

China ratcheted up its tariffs on U.S. autos in July as part of its retaliation against $34 billion in tariffs Trump imposed on Chinese goods.

After the G-20 meeting in Buenos Aires, Trump tweeted that China agreed to lower auto tariffs, but neither side could confirm the claim.

Chinese auto sales in November fell nearly 20 percent from the previous year, the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers said Tuesday. The decline comes amid a months-long contraction in China's overall economy and as the tariff fight with Trump drives uncertainty among potential buyers.

Contributing: The Associated Press

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