Those who seek to dismiss China’s ability to sustain strong growth may need to reconsider their stance.

A combination of solid export growth and sluggish imports increase helped China’s trade surplus reach a new high in 2024.

“We think that December’s data likely benefited from some export frontloading ahead of US President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration later this month,” according to global investment bank ING.

It expressed a view that December’s data benefited from some export frontloading ahead of Trump’s assumption of office.

China’s December export growth rebounded to 10.7 percent from 6.7 percent in November from a year ago, beating consensus forecasts.

December saw $335.6 billion of exports, bringing the full-year exports to $3.58 trillion, which was good for a 5.9 percent growth and comfortably higher than what most economists were expecting at the start of last year.

Data likely benefited from some export frontloading ahead of US President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration this month. Exports to the US rose 15.6 percent in December, which marked a 30-month high, behind only exports to ASEAN (18.9 percent) in December.

For 2024 as a whole, the fastest growth came from ASEAN (12.0 percent) and Latin America (13.0 percent), while exports to developed economies remained modest, with export growth to the US (4.9 percent), EU (3.0 percent), the UK (1.2 percent) and Japan (-3.5 percent) still sluggish.

Export winners

In terms of export product, China’s key winners of 2024 have been concentrated in several key sectors. Ships (57.3 percent), semiconductors (17.4 percent), autos (15.5 percent), and household appliances (14.1 percent) were key areas of strength during the year.

Data showed that there was noticeably stronger volume than value growth for some export categories in 2024, suggesting price competition remains heavy, and this will no doubt add fuel to the fire for those criticizing China of “exporting deflation.” The sectors where we can clearly see this are in auto, steel and household appliances.

China’s December exports were likely supported by frontloading demand.

Import growth remained soft

Import growth was a comparably more modest 1.0 percent YoY, though this too was a recovery from November’s -3.9 percent YoY level. December imports totaled $230.8 billion, bringing full-year imports to $2.59 trillion. Imports grew a tepid 1.1 percent year-on-year in 2024, according to ING.

China’s import data shows a clear divide within the economy. Sectors benefiting from policy support were the only areas of strength in terms of import demand. Automatic data processing equipment imports surged 57.9 percent, semiconductor imports rose 10.4 percent and hi-tech imports were up 10.7 percent as China continued to commit heavy resources toward tech self-sufficiency and hi-tech development.

However, other import categories were quite soft. Commodities demand softened in 2024, with agricultural (-7.9 percent), iron ore (-2.5 percent), crude oil (-3.9 percent), lumber (-1.5 percent), and steel (-9.2 percent) all in negative growth for the year.

Imports also took a hit from a more cautious Chinese consumer. China’s auto imports were down -16.7 percent YoY, as domestic producers dominated the market amid strong price and quality competitiveness and a general slowdown of luxury vehicle purchases.

Cosmetics imports also saw a -9.0 percent YoY decline as consumers shifted to domestic alternatives.