An in‑person Trump–Xi meeting in South Korea did happen on October 30, 2025, in Busan, on the margins of the APEC South Korea summit. At that summit they agreed to cut the U.S. fentanyl‑linked tariff on Chinese imports from 20% to 10% (bringing overall duties on most Chinese goods down from about 57% to 47%) and for China to resume large U.S. soybean purchases and allow rare‑earth exports again. (apnews.com)

However, the deal was explicitly framed as a limited, one‑year truce rather than a comprehensive settlement. HSBC described it as a "one-year tactical trade truce" that temporarily reduces one specific tariff, pauses some reciprocal tariffs and shipping measures for a year, and suspends China’s new rare‑earth export controls for a year, while leaving fundamental disputes over tariffs, overcapacity, and tech export controls unresolved. (privatebanking.hsbc.com) Foreign Policy likewise called it a "framework trade agreement" that institutes a one‑year pause on further hostilities but leaves earlier, very high tariffs and other export controls largely in place. (foreignpolicy.com)

Analysts and reporters were clear that this was not a sweeping, structural reset of U.S.–China trade. The Washington Post characterized it as a trade truce that "avoids an open rupture" but mainly de‑escalates without solving core issues, noting that most tariffs remain and that the relationship is still drifting apart. (washingtonpost.com) The Foreign Exchanges newsletter was even more direct, writing that it "would be wrong to call this a comprehensive trade deal" because it barely touches the existing tariff wall and leaves structural problems untouched. (foreignexchanges.news)

Because the Busan summit produced a narrow, time‑limited truce and framework rather than the kind of comprehensive, "grand" trade deal the prediction envisioned, the prediction is best judged as wrong.