Japanese firms responded to the threat to their exports with a massive foreign direct investment campaign. The U.S. is blocking China from doing the same.

The United States and China have agreed on a framework to implement their trade truce, officials on both sides said Wednesday, after concluding two days of talks in London to defuse tensions and ease export restrictions that threaten to disrupt global manufacturing.

If a handshake agreement holds, it will merely undo some of the damage from the trade war that President Trump started.

Chinese state media say that the U.S. and China have agreed in principle on a framework to resolve their trade disputes.

Investor interest in rare earth minerals is rising, a source of strength for shares in the rare earth miner MP Materials. The stock rose early on Friday after jumping late Thursday following a Bloomberg report that the Defense Department might provide additional capital to boost production.

Private market funds have been underperforming, according to State Street’s latest private equity index, The Financial Times reports. The index, which tracks cash flows from private equity, private debt and venture capital funds, returned 7.08 percent last year, versus the S&P 500’s total return of 25 percent.

The only scenario in which China might deregulate its critical minerals export is if the U.S. fully removes tariffs imposed on Chinese goods as part of the trade war, said Wang Yiwei, a professor of international affairs at Renmin University, echoing the Chinese government’s earlier stance.

S&P Global Commodity Insights discusses consensus price forecasts for industrial and precious metals, including platinum group metals, amid broader market trends.