Chinese exports to U.S. decline as tariffs take toll

Beijing also urges buying from non-u.s. suppliers

BEIJING — China’s 2018 trade surplus with the United States surged to a record $323.3 billion, but exports contracted in December as the delayed impact of President Donald Trump’s tariff hikes started to hurt demand.

Exports to the United States in 2018 rose 11.3 percent to $478.4 billion despite Trump’s punitive duties in a fight over Chinese technology ambitions, customs data showed Monday. Imports of American goods rose just 0.7 percent over 2017, reflecting Beijing’s retaliatory tariffs and encouragement to importers to buy more from non-u.s. suppliers.

In December, Chinese exports to the United States that had held up through much of the year fell 3.5 percent from a year earlier to $40.3 billion. Sales to the U.S. market had kept growing by double digits in previous months as Chinese exporters rushed to fill orders. But forecasters said American orders would slump once the full impact of Trump’s penalties hit.

“Export growth has slowed down dramatically,” noted Nicholas Lardy, a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics. “There’s plenty of anecdotal evidence of layoffs in export-dependent provinces,” including Guangdong on the south China coast.

Lardy said he suspects that many migrant workers won’t return from their home villages to factory jobs at the end of Chinese New Year next month, either because they have been laid off or are waiting to see what happens to the economy.

The slowdown adds to pressure on Beijing to resolve the battle with Trump at a time when the ruling Communist Party also is trying to reverse an economic slowdown.

“The external environment is still complicated and severe,” a customs agency spokesman, Li Kuiwen, said at a news conference.

Li cited dangers including “protectionism and unilateralism”

— a reference to Trump’s import controls — a possible slowdown in global economic growth and a decline in cross-border investment.

U.S. and Chinese officials ended a three-day negotiating session last week with no sign of agreements or word on what their next step would be.

“The record U.S. trade deficit with China will sit uncomfortably with the Trump administration,” Nick Marro of the Economist Intelligence Unit said in a report. “That may cast a shadow over the next round of trade talks.”

Trump and his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, agreed on Dec. 1 to postpone additional tariff hikes by 90 days while they negotiated. But penalties of up to 25 percent already imposed on billions of dollars of each other’s goods remain in place, raising the cost for American and Chinese buyers of soybeans, medical equipment and other goods.