Donald Trump has revealed that Chinese President Xi Jinping personally offered to help the US smash Iran's chokehold on the Strait of Hormuz. 'President Xi would like to see a deal made,' Trump told Fox News . 'He said, "If I can be of any help at all, I would like to be of help." Anybody that buys that much oil has obviously got some kind of relationship, but he'd like to see the Hormuz Strait open.' Trump did not say what Xi would want in return, but Beijing is seeking tariff relief and access to cutting-edge American AI chips. Nvidia boss Jensen Huang, who joined Trump on the trip after a personal invitation from the President, has already seen movement, with the US clearing around 10 Chinese firms including Alibaba, Tencent and ByteDance to buy its second-most powerful AI chip, the H200. Nvidia's stock was up more than 4 percent Thursday.

While the President has been effusive in his praise for Xi, the Chinese leader threatened to dim the mood earlier on Thursday, warning that any mishandling of Taiwan could lead to 'an extremely dangerous situation.' 'Handled well, relations between the two countries can maintain overall stability,' Xi said, according to the foreign ministry. 'If handled poorly, the two countries will collide or even clash.' Trump is walking into negotiations with his hands tied behind his back after launching the Iran war on February 28, international experts have warned. The summit was delayed from its original March date as the US tried to broker peace in the Persian Gulf, where the conflict has throttled the Strait of Hormuz and sent global oil prices soaring.

Trump has claimed that China, which imports around half its crude oil from the Hormuz Strait, is far more desperate than the US to see the passageway reopened. But US intelligence assessments have found China is sitting on vast oil reserves and has been dangling energy assistance to American allies, including Australia, Thailand and the Philippines, seizing on the crisis to burnish its superpower credentials. Beijing has also stepped in to arm Washington's Gulf allies as the US runs low on missile stockpiles, according to a Joint Staff analysis drawn up for General Dan Caine this week. US forces have raced through nearly half their Patriot interceptor stockpile, more than half their THAAD defenses and over 850 Tomahawk cruise missiles in the 39-day war, according to a Center for Strategic and International Studies analysis. Replacing them will take three to five years.

The drain has rattled Taiwan, Japan and South Korea, where officials are openly questioning whether the US can still be relied on to defend them. Trump did not publicly respond to Xi's Taiwan warning. Asked after the morning summit how the talks had progressed, Trump offered only: 'Great. Great place. Incredible. China's beautiful.' A readout of the meeting from a White House official also made no mention of Taiwan. US sales of military equipment to the self-ruled island, which Beijing claims as its own, have long enraged the Chinese government and threaten to derail already-fraught engagement on trade between the world's top two economies.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Trump would say more on Taiwan 'in the coming days', adding that the President 'understands the sensitivities' about the island. Trump said days before the trip that he would discuss US arms sales to Taiwan with Xi, something that would be a break with a decades-long policy of not consulting with Beijing on the issue. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, also in Beijing and known for his hardline stance on China during his Senate years, suggested continuity in an interview aboard Air Force One. 'It's not in China's interest or anyone's interest for there to be any sort of forced change in the status quo. I think stability there is very important,' he told Fox News.

Trump could seek to use US arms sales to Taiwan as a bargaining chip to push Beijing into leaning on Tehran to accept a deal ending the war, according to reports. Ryan Hass, an expert on China and Taiwan at the Washington-based Brookings Institution, threw cold water on the proposition. 'Doing so would violate Beijing's longstanding principle that Taiwan is "non-negotiable." It isn't how Beijing rolls,' he wrote on social media. 'More likely, both leaders will affirm their shared interest in stabilizing relations and use (economic and) commercial deals to demonstrate progress.'