Today (18 December), at the mid-point of the third round of Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) negotiations, US and EU negotiators took time to share information with and hear viewpoints from more than 350 stakeholders from environmental, consumer, and other non-governmental organizations, labour unions, business, and academia.

TRADE ministers of the 12 Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) countries last week completed a successful meeting in Singapore. They made "substantial" progress by identifying the "potential landing zones" in a majority of outstanding areas during the meeting. United States Trade Representative Michael Froman - who was likened to a "hard taskmaster" by his Australian counterpart Andrew Robb - led the negotiations round the clock in different formats.

Dec 13 (Reuters) - China said on Friday it would stop levying anti-dumping and anti-subsidy duties on certain types of cars imported from the United States when the measures expire on Dec. 15. On Dec. 14, 2011, China started levying punitive duties on sedans and sport-utility vehicles (SUV) with engines of 2.5 litres and above imported from the United States, in retaliation for U.S. trade policies.

BRUSSELS, Dec 13 (Reuters) - China is pressing ahead with an investigation into French and Spanish wine exports despite a deal with the European Union to defuse trade tensions, creating unease about Beijing's intentions. Beijing began an inquiry in July into whether Europe was selling wine in China at unfairly low prices with the help of subsidies. That was widely considered to be retaliation for an EU move to impose punitive duties on Chinese solar panels.

A third round of EU-US trade talks will kick off in Washington D.C. this coming Monday, 16 December 2013. The talks will help pave the way for a future Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership, or TTIP. An EU-commissioned study by independent think tank CEPR suggests the deal could boost the EU economy by up to €120bn a year. Negotiators will again focus on a broad range of issues, including:

Trade ministers from 12 countries negotiating the Trans Pacific Partnership free trade agreement were unable to reach a deal following a four-day meeting in Singapore this week. But analysts expect quick progress in the coming months on the ambitious, United States-led trade pact, which will cover nearly 40 percent of global economic output when completed. 

TOKYO, Dec. 12 (Xinhua) -- Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Thursday called for a senior minister of his Cabinet to speed up talks on the sluggish Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) free trade deal and insisted an agreement be found at an early juncture. Abe told Yasutoshi Nishimura, senior vice minister of the Cabinet Office, to stick to a previous commitment made with the other 11 TPP-member nations to finalize a deal by the year-end deadline.

LONDON/SINGAPORE, Dec 11 (Reuters) - Recent declines in European and Asian steel prices are not likely to derail a modest market recovery over the past five months, but instead these prices are expected to rise to narrow the gap with higher U.S. levels. Leading steelmakers, after posting forecast-beating quarterly results, have become more optimistic on the outlook for the $500 billion-a-year industry, which is often seen as gauge of economic health.

(Reuters) - An ambitious trade pact between a dozen countries around the Pacific Rim will not be finalized this year as hoped, with no agreement on thorny issues like intellectual property, agricultural tariffs and state-owned enterprises. The U.S.-backed deal, which Washington wanted to conclude this year, aims to establish a free-trade bloc stretching from Vietnam to Chile andJapan, encompassing about 800 million people and almost 40 percent of the global economy. But differences over farm tariffs between the United States and Japan proved to be one of the major roadblocks.

Dec 9 (Reuters) - Expectations are growing that an ambitious trade pact between a dozen nations around the Pacific Rim may be wrapped up in 2-3 months, with signs that political desire for a deal is trumping a string of technical difficulties in drawing it up. Just days after the first World Trade Organisation trade reform deal was pushed through on Saturday, trade ministers from 12 countries are in closed-door talks in a Singapore hotel to try to tie up the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP).