China Merchandise Imports

Merchandise trade surplus increases in May

Latest reading: In May, the trade balance was USD +105.4 billion, following a USD +84.8 billion figure in the prior month. Over the last 12 months, the trade balance summed to USD +1166.3 billion. Merchandise exports were up 19.4% in annual terms in May, following 14.1% growth in the prior month and beating market expectations. Exports grew by double digits to most major trading partners, bolstered by booming global demand for AI. Merchandise imports increased 27.5% in annual terms in May, coming on the back of 25.3% growth in the prior month.

Panelist insight: Digging into the AI theme, Nomura analysts said: “Robust semiconductor trade remained the dominant driver of highly elevated export and import growth in May, with the divergence between value and volume growth widening further, as chip price increases continued to overwhelm quantity growth. We estimate chips contributed 5.9pp to headline export growth. Together with automatic data processing (ADP)? equipment, which is also closely linked to the current global AI boom and contributed an additional 3.4pp, AI-related exports accounted for 9.3pp. This marks two consecutive months in which AI-related exports have accounted for around half of China's total export growth, underscoring the outsized role of the global AI supercycle.”

How should you choose a forecaster if some are too optimistic while others are too pessimistic? FocusEconomics collects Chinese merchandise imports projections for the next ten years from a panel of 11 analysts at the leading national, regional and global forecast institutions. These projections are then validated by our in-house team of economists and data analysts and averaged to provide one Consensus Forecast you can rely on for each indicator. By averaging all forecasts, upside and downside forecasting errors tend to cancel each other out, leading to the most reliable merchandise imports forecast available for Chinese merchandise imports.

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