Event: according to the statistics of the General Administration of customs, priced in RMB, China's exports increased by 12.9% year-on-year in March 2022, imports decreased by 1.7% year-on-year, and the trade surplus in March was 300.58 billion yuan. In dollar terms, China's exports increased by 14.7% year-on-year in March, while imports decreased by 0.1% year-on-year. The trade surplus in March was US $47.38 billion.
Export growth rose sharply in March and continued to remain resilient. Denominated in RMB, the total export value in March was 175354 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 12.9%, an increase of 8.8 percentage points compared with February. The re outbreak of the epidemic in China, Limited Logistics and other negative factors did not significantly drag down exports, and the export growth rate continued to maintain a high growth. On the demand side, JPMorgan's global manufacturing PMI recorded 53% in March, a decrease of 0.6 percentage points from February, the lowest since September 2020, but it has been on the boom and bust line for 21 consecutive months, and the global economic recovery has a marginal slowdown trend. However, compared with history, the overall prosperity is still high, China's supply advantage has laid the export toughness, and China's export substitution logic is still. In terms of major export categories, from January to March, the cumulative export amount of China's export of mechanical and electrical products increased by 9.8% year-on-year, including rapid growth in automobile (83.4%) and integrated circuit (20.8%); Labor intensive products such as shoes and boots (20.4%), bags and similar containers (24.0%) performed well. In addition, from January to March, the cumulative export amount of rare earth, unwrought aluminum and aluminum products increased by 74.6% and 61.5% year-on-year.
In March, import growth turned negative and domestic demand slowed down. Priced in RMB, China's total imports in March were 145295 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 1.7%, down 10.0 percentage points from February. In March, the PMI indexes of manufacturing and service industries recorded 49.5% and 46.7% respectively, both falling to the boom and bust line. The import growth rate turned negative year-on-year, or the epidemic occurred in many places, resulting in the temporary production reduction and shutdown of some enterprises in some areas, which affected the normal production and operation of upstream and downstream related enterprises, and restrained the residents' willingness to consume. The problem of insufficient demand in China was further highlighted. From the perspective of main import categories, the import amount of Shenzhen Agricultural Products Group Co.Ltd(000061) category in the first three months decreased significantly year-on-year, of which meat (including offal) and edible vegetable oil decreased by 24.9% and 43.3% respectively. Geopolitics and other factors pushed up international commodity prices, with coal and lignite (66.3%), natural gas (65.3%) and refined oil (43.9%) increasing significantly year-on-year.
From January to March, the import and export to the four major trading partners continued to grow year-on-year. Priced in RMB, from January to March, China's exports to the EU, the United States, ASEAN and Japan increased by 21%, 14.3%, 10.0% and 6.1% respectively year-on-year, and the year-on-year growth rate remained stable. Overall, China's exports to major economies remained stable from January to March. Denominated in RMB, the trade surplus in March was 300.58 billion yuan, up from the previous month. At the same time, it was the highest value in the same period in history, and the foreign trade situation was better.
Overall, export growth remained resilient in March, and import growth turned negative year-on-year. In terms of exports, in March, in the face of negative factors such as the re outbreak of China's epidemic and limited logistics, the export growth rate continued to maintain resilience. In terms of import, the current epidemic has a great impact on the production and operation of enterprises and the recovery of residents' consumption. In March, the year-on-year growth rate of import turned negative, and domestic demand was relatively weak. Looking forward to April, in terms of exports, although the Federal Reserve accelerates the process of raising interest rates, it may disturb the global capital flow. However, due to the continuity of China's monetary policy and strong exports in the past two years, the RMB exchange rate bucked the trend and was particularly stable. At the same time, the national standing committee meeting on April 13 mentioned to further strengthen policy support such as export tax rebate to promote the stable development of foreign trade. In addition, the State Council, the national development and Reform Commission and other relevant departments also said that they would open up the blocking points and breakpoints of logistics transportation and distribution as soon as possible, fully ensure the smooth transportation of freight logistics, especially important production and living materials, maintain the stability of the industrial chain and supply chain, and further boost the export boom. In terms of import, as the epidemic situation is gradually controlled and the steady growth policy continues to increase, the policy increases support for industries seriously affected by the epidemic, small, medium-sized and micro enterprises and individual industrial and commercial households, and the year-on-year growth rate of import is expected to increase.
Risk tip: the upside down of interest rate spread between China and the United States leads to capital outflow; The epidemic situation in China has repeatedly made it more difficult to stabilize economic growth.
