Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has played a balancing act trying to reassure nervous investors that the U.S. would maintain its global leadership role while staying true to the Trump administration’s skepticism of multilateral banking organizations.

Bessent spoke to the Institute of International Finance as both the International Monetary Fund and World Bank held their spring meetings in Washington. On Monday, the IMF downgraded its forecast of U.S. economic growth to 1.8% this year, a reduction from the 2.7% it estimated as recently as January.

U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said on Wednesday that high tariffs between the United States and China are not sustainable, as President Donald Trump's administration signaled openness to de-escalating a trade war between the world's two largest economies that has raised fears of recession.

President Trump hasn’t offered to take down U.S. tariffs on China on a unilateral basis, Bloomberg News quoted Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent as saying. Bessent answered questions from reporters Wednesday,

El secretario del Tesoro, Scott Bessent, dijo que el presidente Donald Trump no ha ofrecido reducir los aranceles estadounidenses a China de manera unilateral.