**Traders see little chance of a US-China agreement to pace frontier AI development in 2026 because both nations continue prioritizing competitive speed over mutual restraint.** Recent months show intensified rivalry, with the US maintaining export controls on advanced chips while Chinese labs close performance gaps on benchmarks through open-weight models and rapid iteration. The September 2026 Trump-Xi summit produced only an AI incident communication channel and scheduled dialogue—not commitments to slow large language model training or capability advances. US officials have rejected calls for deliberate pacing, citing risks of ceding leadership, while Beijing emphasizes “safety and controllability” alongside faster strategic breakthroughs. Upcoming November talks and the APEC summit may expand risk-sharing mechanisms, yet persistent distrust, divergent governance approaches, and domestic incentives make a formal pacing accord improbable absent a major shared crisis.