Ryosei Akazawa met President Donald Trump on Wednesday and held talks with senior US officials as Japan looks to pare back stiff levies announced by the White House.
“I’ve met now with most of the principals who are in the room and doing the negotiating... I’m extremely optimistic that a deal will get done,“ ambassador George Glass told reporters.
“And when I saw that President Trump then decided he was going to get involved and has now named this his top priority, that’s why I have a lot of confidence that we’ll get something done.”
But the country is subject to the same 10 percent baseline tariffs imposed by Trump on most countries as well as painful steeper levies on cars, steel and alumium.
Yen strength
Trump said after meeting Akazawa on his Truth Social platform that there had been “big progress”.
But he added that Trump “has expressed his desire to give the negotiations with Japan the highest priority”.
In addition to taking more US goods, Trump reportedly wants Japan to buy more US defence equipment and strengthen the yen against the dollar.
The US president also reportedly wants Japan to pay more for hosting 54,000 US military personnel in Japan, from the current $1.4 billion a year.
Stephen Innes at SPI Asset Management said: “These talks aren’t just bilateral -- they’re a global litmus test.
Officials from Indonesia also held talks in Washington this week, while the finance minister of South Korea, a major semiconductor and auto exporter, will meet Bessent next week.
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