China’s exports fall 3.2% in September amid trade war with US

Mon, Oct 14, 2019
By publisher
2 MIN READ

Foreign

CHINA’s exports dropped 3.2 per cent year-on-year in September, while imports plunged 8.5 per cent, according to customs data released Monday.

Both the exports and imports performed slightly worse than analysts had expected, underscoring the pressure on the Chinese economy from a trade war with the U.S.

In August, China’s exports fell by 1 per cent year-on-year, while imports fell 5.6 per cent amid slowing shipments to the U.S.

Chinese and U.S officials last week agreed on a truce in their year-long trade war, with U.S President Donald Trump suspending a new batch of tariffs that were meant to go into effect this week, and Beijing promising to buy more U.S agricultural products.

The negotiations, spanning areas such as intellectual property and financial services, produced what Trump called phase one of a “substantial deal”.

Chinese imports from the U.S fell 15.7 per cent year-on-year in September, while exports dropped 21.9 per cent.

For the nine months ending in September, Chinese imports from the U.S plummeted 26.4 per cent, while exports dropped 10.7 per cent.

The U.S-China trade deficit for the first three quarters of the year was 221.3 billion dollars, about 2 per cent smaller than the same period last year, according to Chinese customs data.

Trump’s displeasure with the large trade deficit between the world’s two largest economies was at the heart of the countries’ trade conflict.

Washington also accuses Beijing of intellectual property theft, forced technology transfers and treating foreign firms differently from domestic firms.  (dpa/NAN)

– Oct 14, 2019 @ 8:45 GMT |

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