On March 7, the General Administration of Customs released the foreign trade data from January to February 2022. The data from January to February showed that exports remained resilient in the first quarter. The pace of exports has a profound impact on the strength and timing of China's measures to stabilize growth, and also on the form in which China's GDP growth rate of 5.5% this year is achieved. The follow-up needs to pay attention to the speed and rhythm of export decline this year.
At present, there is not much change in the export kinetic energy. From January to February, the export growth rate was 16.3% year-on-year, which was slightly lower than that in December 2021 (Two-year compound year-on-year 20.9%).
We tend to think that the slight decline in export growth this month is more due to short-term disturbance factors. A similar situation occurred last year. The compound year-on-year growth rate of exports from January to February 2021 (15.1%) was also significantly lower than that in December 2020 (18.0%), but the year-on-year growth rate of exports last year was relatively high. It is not suitable to judge the export trend with single month data.
In absolute terms, the current export growth rate is still at a high level, the second highest in the same period in recent 8 years, only lower than that in the same period in 2018.
Among the major export countries, the most obvious decline is the growth rate of China's exports to the United States. This decline may be due to the deterioration of covid-19 epidemic in the United States at the beginning of the year. The number of new cases in January hit a record high, and the number of new cases in January alone has been nearly twice that of the whole quarter of Q4 last year. It should be noted that the monthly fluctuation of China's exports to the United States is large. Whether the kinetic energy of China's exports to the United States is declining needs to be observed separately.
In conclusion, the slight decline in export growth from January to February can not be used as a sign of the beginning of the decline in export momentum.
How to judge the future export trend?
The market pays attention to two points: first, whether the export growth rate will drop rapidly; Second, when will the inflection point of export kinetic energy appear?
At present, the household savings boosted by the US fiscal and monetary stimulus still form a certain support for commodity demand. On the other hand, the production repair of overseas economies such as Europe, America and ASEAN is still in progress. Theoretically, the export momentum will not decline rapidly and significantly this year. The kinetic inflection point of export growth this year may appear as early as the second quarter.
What is unexpected is the recent conflict between Russia and Ukraine. The direction of the future conflict between Russia and Ukraine and whether it will further affect global commodity and trade supply and demand and China's export momentum need to be closely followed up. Risk tips: the development of the epidemic exceeded expectations, the decline of overseas demand exceeded expectations, trade frictions exceeded expectations, and the development of geopolitical events exceeded expectations.
