Chinese exports soared in March ahead of Trump's 'Liberation Day'

Beijing and Washington have been locked in a fast-moving, high-stakes game of brinkmanship since Trump launched a global tariff assault that has particularly targeted Chinese imports.

Tit-for-tat exchanges have seen US levies imposed on China rise to 145 percent, and Beijing setting a retaliatory 125 percent toll on US imports.

Figures released by Beijing's General Administration of Customs on Monday showed a 12.4 percent jump in overseas shipments, more than double the 4.6 percent predicted in a Bloomberg survey.

Imports during the same period fell 4.3 percent, an improvement on the first two months of the year in a sign of rebounding domestic consumption.

Beijing also said Monday that the United States remained the largest single overseas destination for Chinese goods from January to March, amounting to $115.6 billion.

Last month, which saw a second round of US tariffs imposed on Chinese goods, the country's exports to the United States increased by about nine percent year-on-year, Beijing said.

China's top leaders have set an ambitious annual growth target of around five percent, vowing to make domestic demand its main economic driver.

But its fragile recovery faces fresh headwinds from Trump's trade war.

The US side appeared to dial down the pressure on Friday, listing tariff exemptions for smartphones, laptops, semiconductors and other electronic products of which China is a major source.
Frontloading
Analysts attributed the March surge to a rush to export ahead of Trump's April 2 "Liberation Day" tariffs on all trade partners that sent global markets tumbling.

"The strong export data reflect frontloading of trade before the US tariffs were announced," Zhiwei Zhang, President and Chief Economist at Pinpoint Asset Management said in a note.

"China's exports will likely weaken in coming months as the US tariffs skyrocket," he added.

"The uncertainty of trade policies is extremely high," Zhang said.

Julian Evans-Pritchard, head of China economics at Capital Economics, said in a note that "in anticipation of even higher duties, demand from US importers continued to hold up fairly well" in March.

"But shipments are set to drop back over the coming months and quarters," he added.

"It could be years before Chinese exports regain current levels."

And the world's second-largest economy continues to struggle with sluggish consumption and a prolonged debt crisis in its property sector.

Beijing last year announced a string of aggressive measures to reignite growth, including cutting interest rates, cancelling restrictions on homebuying, hiking the debt ceiling for local governments and bolstering support for financial markets.

But after a blistering market rally last year fuelled by hopes for a long-awaited "bazooka stimulus", optimism waned as authorities refrained from providing a specific figure for the bailout or fleshing out any of the pledges.