US President Donald Trump says that over the next two to three weeks US officials will be sending letters to countries outlining “what they will be paying to do business in the United States”.

Trump, speaking in the capital of the United Arab Emirates Abu Dhabi on the last stage of a four-day tour of Gulf countries, did not clarify further what that meant.

China and the United States announced a truce in their trade war on Monday after talks in Geneva, which Trump mentioned in his Abu Dhabi remarks along with a separate trade deal with the United Kingdom.

“At a certain point over the next two to three weeks I think (US Treasury Secretary) Scott (Bessent) and (US Commerce Secretary) Howard (Lutnick) will be sending letters out … telling people what they’ll be paying to do business in the United States.”

He said countries could appeal it and that US officials would not be able to meet with all the “150 countries that want to make a deal”.

The US also agreed a limited bilateral trade agreement with the UK last week, which leaves in place Trump’s 10 per cent tariffs on UK exports while cutting higher tariffs on steel and cars.

Abu Dhabi was Trump’s last stop on a Gulf tour focused on business deals worth hundred of billions of dollars that could boost the US economy and create jobs.

AI chips deal

The United Arab Emirates and the United States have agreed to create a path for the Gulf country to buy some of the most advanced artificial intelligence semiconductors from US companies, a major win for Abu Dhabi’s efforts to become a global AI hub.

President Donald Trump made the announcement as he wrapped his Gulf tour, with a pledge by oil power Abu Dhabi – the UAE’s capital and richest emirate – to hike the value of its energy investments in the US to $US440 billion ($685 billion) in the next decade.

He pledged on Thursday to strengthen US ties with the UAE, announcing deals totalling over $US200 billion, including a $US14.5 billion commitment from Etihad Airways to invest in 28 American-made Boeing aircraft.

“We work together and the money that’s made here comes back to us,” Trump told Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Sheikh Khaled bin Mohamed bin Zayed during a news conference in Abu Dhabi on Friday, touting the business relationship between the US and UAE.

“We’ve made it work, and you know they were being wooed by others. But there’s no more wooing, I think we’re in pretty good shape,” he said.

“Absolutely,” the crown prince said.

The AI deal, finalised on Thursday, is a boost for the UAE, which has been trying to balance its relations with its longtime ally the US and its largest trading partner China.

It reflects the Trump administration’s confidence that the chips can be managed securely, in part by requiring data centres be managed by US companies.

“Yesterday the two countries also agreed to create a path for UAE to buy some of the world’s most advanced AI semiconductors from American companies, a very big contract,” Trump said.

The UAE energy investment commitment was announced during a presentation by Sultan Al Jaber, Abu Dhabi state energy giant ADNOC’s chief executive, to Trump during the last stage of his tour that has drawn huge financial commitments from the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Qatar.

The enterprise value of UAE investments in the US energy sector would be boosted to $US440 billion by 2035 from $US70 billion now, Al Jaber told Trump, adding US energy firms will also invest in the UAE.

Already in March, when senior UAE officials met Trump, the UAE had committed to a 10-year, $US1.4 trillion investment framework in the US in sectors including energy, AI and manufacturing to deepen reciprocal ties.

“We’re making great progress for the $US1.4 (trillion) that UAE has announced it intends to spend in the United States,” Trump said on his last stop on a Gulf tour that has focused, at least publicly, on investment deals, not security crises in the Middle East, including Israel’s war in Gaza.

However, Trump did engage in some diplomacy on his whirlwind meetings with some of the world’s biggest energy producers.

He met with Syria’s new interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa in Riyadh and said he would order the lifting of sanctions on Syria at the behest of Saudi Arabia’s crown prince, a major US policy shift.

—AAP