Economy | China’s trade tumbles in January

A man plays with balls as a salesperson looks out from the booth selling children’s clothing at the Wangfujing shopping district in Beijing

China’s trade tumbled in January, in a possible fresh sign of the weakness confronting the world’s No. 2 economy.
Exports fell 11.2 percent to USD177.5 billion, a sharp deterioration from the 1.4 percent decline reported for December, according to customs data released yesterday.
Imports shrank by 18.8 percent to $114.2 billion, a faster fall than the previous month’s 7.6 percent contraction, leaving a trade surplus of $63.3 billion.
The export figure reflected weaker demand for shipments of manufactured goods as the global recovery continues to stumble.
Economists, however, were reserving final analysis until figures for February are out because the timing of the Lunar New Year holiday distorts China’s economic data at the beginning of the year.
Companies in China shut down for the weeklong holiday, which falls at different times in January or February. In the run-up to the holiday, which this year occurred last week, factories stock up on raw materials and rush to fill orders.
“The lower-than-expected exports in January was likely caused by some frontloading of shipments into December,” ANZ Bank economists Liu Li-gang and Louis Lam wrote in a report. They said that December’s export figures were probably better than expected for the same reason.
China’s economy posted its slowest growth in a quarter century last year, expanding 6.9 percent. Officials expect growth this year of between 6.5 and 7 percent.
Growth is slowing as the country’s communist leaders try to wean the economy off export-led manufacturing and instead focus on more self-­sustaining domestic consumption and services. AP