While Donald Trump hailed the outcome of trade talks in London, Xi Jinping walked away with an understated strategic gain: a negotiating process that buys China time and helps defuse the threat of more harmful tariffs and technology curbs.

"The two sides have, in principle, reached a framework for implementing the consensus reached by the two heads of state during the phone call on June 5th and the consensus reached at the Geneva meeting," China's Vice Commerce Minister Li Chenggang said.

President Trump railed against Xi Jinping in a late-night social media post days ahead of their planned call, complaining that the Chinese leader is “extremely hard to make a deal with” as trade talks stall.