Trump vowed to impose a 10 per cent tariff on $300 billion of Chinese imports from September 1, sharply escalating a bruising trade war between the world's largest economies and jolting financial markets.

The announcement on Thursday extends Mr Trump's trade tariffs to nearly all of the Chinese goods the US imports and marks an abrupt end to a temporary truce in a trade row that has hurt world growth and disrupted global supply chains.

Mr Trump also threatened to raise tariffs further if China's President Xi Jinping fails to move more quickly to strike a trade deal.

"I think President Xi ... wants to make a deal, but frankly, he's not going fast enough," Mr Trump said.

Mr Trump made the announcement in a series of Twitter posts after his top trade negotiators briefed him on a lack of progress in US-China talks in Shanghai this week.

Mr Trump later said if trade negotiations fail to progress he could raise tariffs further - even beyond the 25 per cent levy he has already imposed on $250 billion of imports from China.

Senior Chinese diplomat Wang Yi told reporters on the sidelines of an Association of Southeast Nations event in Thailand the additional tariffs were "not a correct way" to deal with the bilateral dispute.

"Additional tariffs is definitely not a constructive way to resolve economic and trade frictions," he said.