The decision was characterized as the latest in a series of tit-for-tat trade war deescalations by Beijing and Washington (though Beijing is struggling with a deadly outbreak of swine flu that has killed off nearly one-third of the country's pigs, and also has been struggling to find replacements to source soybeans, it's funny how importing stuff they need has been characterized as "goodwill").

Still, China's Xinhua News Agency reported on Friday that China's National Development and Reform Commission and the Ministry of Commerce had decided to make the exemption in response to the US's decision to postpone a hike in the tariff rate on $250 billion of Chinese goods from October 1 to October 15.