Treasury Secretary Bessent says ‘everything is on the table,’ could remove Chinese stocks from US exchanges

As the war between China and the US intensifies, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has said that they are considering removing Chinese companies from American stock markets. 

According to Bessent, the decision to delist Chinese stocks will ultimately lie with Trump. He said, “That will be Trump’s decision.” 

Bessent’s views come at a time when the global trade war is getting worse, and the US is moving toward more protectionist economic policies. After US President Donald Trump raised the total tax on goods coming from China to 104% on Wednesday, the Xi government raised the tariffs on the US to 84% in response.

In addition, he told US partners who want to work with the US to think about how to rebalance China.

Bessent has also told China not to devalue its currency to get a trade edge.  He said,  “China should not try to devalue their way out of this.”

Instead, he advised that China should engage more openly with the US and its allies, adding that “China should come to the table.” According to Bessent, diplomatic and economic negotiations could still play a role if China chooses dialogue over retaliation.

China’s trade escalation is bad, a loss for them – Scott Bessent

As of March 2025, there were 286 Chinese companies listed on various US exchanges, with a combined market capitalization of $1.1 trillion. That value has climbed by $250 billion since the beginning of 2024 when this table tracked only 265 Chinese businesses listed on US markets with a total market capitalization of $848 billion.

Since January 2024, 48 Chinese firms have listed on three US exchanges, raising $2.1 billion in total initial public offerings (IPOs).

Bessent said, “They can raise their tariffs, but so what?” According to him, it’s a shame that China doesn’t want to negotiate. He added that the Chinese are the worst offenders in the international trade system, adding that “all options are on the table.”

Bessent says that the US Treasury will take a stronger role in bank regulation

Scott Bessent said that his department will be more involved in regulating banks to ensure that costs and benefits are better balanced and that lenders can help the US economy grow. He also said that in the past, bank regulators had a lot of power over almost every part of daily life. However, they weren’t really responsible to the American people.

In the most obvious way, regulation through supervision has too often happened behind a curtain of secrecy. This made it impossible for the public and their chosen officials to look closely.

Therefore, the Treasury Department wants to change the supervision culture by improving examination procedures, keeping a closer eye on how well examiners follow those procedures, and making it easier for people to appeal supervisory decisions. 

Bessent said. “Perhaps the most consequential step would be to define ‘unsafe and unsound’ by rule using more objective measures rooted in financial risk.”

In prepared remarks for a conference of the American Bankers Association, Bessent called for “commonsense principles” to be used in banking laws to make things easier, especially for community banks that have had to deal with rules that were made for bigger banks.

"Treasury Department intends to play a greater role in financial regulation," Bessent tells @ABABankers.

"FSOC is one potential forum. The president's Working Group on Financial Markets is another option."

ICYMI, my and @RachelWitkowski's story: https://t.co/JXgILRZPTC

— Eleanor Mueller (@Eleanor_Mueller) April 9, 2025

Bessent said that the Financial Stability Oversight Council, which is made up of the heads of the Federal Reserve and other bank officials and meets regularly, would allow the Treasury to be more involved in how bank rules are made.

Besides that, he said he would use the President’s Working Group on Capital Markets. It is a smaller group that looks at financial trends and has met during financial disasters. One more way for the Treasury to do this is to work with individual officials like the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation or the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency. 

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