MNI China Press Digest May 18: Liu He & Trump, Yuan,Deleverage

     BEIJING (MNI) - The following lists highlights from the Chinese press for

Friday:

     Chinese Vice Premier Liu He and U.S. President Donald Trump stressed the

importance of the China-U.S. relations and said efforts are needed for further

advancing the development of the relations during their meeting in Washington,

the official People's Daily said. China is willing to adequately tackle economic

and trade issues with the U.S., the Daily reported citing Liu. Trump urged the

two nations' negotiation teams to resolve issues in economic and trade

relations, the Daily said. The two countries have more room for expanding

economic and trade cooperation, the newspaper said citing Trump. China and the

U.S. should strengthen cooperation in energy and manufacturing, expand trade and

market access of agricultural products, enhance the protection of intellectual

property, Trump said, according to the newspaper.

     The yuan may not fall much against the dollar as the rise of the dollar

index is expected to slow, China Securities Journal reported. While the dollar

hasn't necessarily peaked, the yuan has outperformed currencies other than the

dollar, the newspaper said citing unidentified analysts. U.S. growth lacks

further momentum, especially as the U.S. real interest rate rebounded again

recently, the journal reported citing Ming Ming, chief fixed-income analyst at

Citic Securities.

     China's leverage ratio is expected to further decline in the future,

Financial News reported. The future focus would be structural deleveraging of

sectors of the economy such as SOEs and controlling local government debt, the

newspaper said. Overall leverage level is still high now, especially the high

levels of debt held by SOEs, the newspaper said citing unidentified sources.

Deleveraging of SOEs may be accelerated as indicated by the recent emphasis on

the issue made by the government, Financial News said.

--MNI Beijing Bureau; +86 (10) 8532-5998; email: iris.ouyang@marketnews.com

--MNI Beijing Bureau; +86 10 8532 5998; email: william.bi@mni-news.com

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