Chinese trade surplus widens in March as exports surge but imports worsen
- Prior +$4.08 billion; revised to +$4.12 billion
- Exports +14.2% vs +7.3% y/y expected
- Imports -7.6% vs -1.3% y/y expected
The above is in dollar terms. As a whole in Q1, Chinese dollar-denominated exports grew by 1.4% y/y while imports shrank by 4.8% y/y. That leads to a trade surplus of $76.3 billion for the first quarter. Reckon that's not something that Trump will be too happy about.
As a whole, the jump in exports will be taken as a positive but that is very much offset by the slump in imports - indicating that domestic demand is rather poor. I'm not sure there's too much optimism that can be taken away from the report here really.
Meanwhile, these are figures for the March trade data in yuan terms:
- Trade balance ¥220 billion vs ¥178 billion expected
- Exports +21.3% vs +14.8% y/y expected
- Imports -1.8% vs -9.6% y/y expected
