A cargo ship carries foreign trade containers on the Jiaozhou Bay waterway in Qingdao, Shandong Province, China, on August 5, 2025.
Costfoto | Nurphoto | Getty Images
China’s export growth in July sharply beat market expectations as the clock on a tariff truce with the U.S. keeps ticking, while imports rose to their highest in a year.
Exports climbed 7.2% in July in U.S. dollar terms from a year earlier, customs data showed Thursday, exceeding Reuters-polled economists’ estimates of a 5.4% rise.
Imports rose 4.1% last month from a year earlier, marking the biggest jump since July 2024, according to LSEG data. The data also indicated a recovery in import levels following June’s 1.1% rebound. Economists had forecast imports in July to fall 1.0%, according to a Reuters poll.
On a year-to-date basis, China’s overall exports jumped 6.1% from a year earlier, while imports fell 2.7%, customs data showed. China’s trade surplus this year, as of July, reached $683.5 billion, 32% higher than the same period in 2024.
China’s exports have supported the economy “strongly” so far this year, said Zhiwei Zhang, president and chief economist at Pinpoint Asset Management, cautioning that the momentum of businesses’ shipment front-loading may soon fade.
However, Beijing’s exports to the U.S. fell for the fourth consecutive month on a year-over-year basis. In July, it shrank 21.7% from a year earlier. Imports from the U.S. also dropped 18.9% year over year.
July’s export declines were largely offset by shipments diverted to alternative markets such as Southeast Asia, which increased 16.6%, while imports fell 5.8% from a year earlier. China’s exports to the European Union also rose 9.2% while imports fell 1.6%.
In July, China’s exports of rare earths surged 21.4% from a year ago to 5,994.3 tones while auto exports grew 26% to 694,000 units. Exports of semiconductors rose 16% from a year ago to 31.8 billion units.
China’s imports of soybeans rose 18.4% to 11.66 million tones, while crude oil imports grew 11.5% from a year earlier.
The U.S. and Chinese negotiators have yet to strike an agreement that would keep the triple-digit tariffs at bay as the truce expires on Aug.12.
China’s U.S.-bound goods currently face a 20% tariff related to the country’s alleged role in the flow of fentanyl into the U.S., a 10% baseline tariff, stacked on top of a 25% duty on certain goods imposed during Trump’s first term.
Trump has threatened to impose new sectoral levies that will impact countries including China, such as a tariff on pharmaceuticals that could go up to 200%, and an about 100% “secondary tariff” for buying Russian oil.
So far, Beijing has agreed to end its export ban on rare-earth metals and magnets to the U.S. following a series of negotiations, while Washington has agreed to restart shipments of semiconductor design software and production materials.
Semiconductor giant Nvidia said last month that the U.S. government was reviewing its licenses to potentially allow it to resume sales of H20 chips to Chinese clients, reversing a ban the Trump administration imposed in April.
China’s factory activity unexpectedly deteriorated to a three-month low in July, with the official manufacturing purchasing managers’ index falling to 49.3 from June’s reading of 49.7, missing expectations for 49.7.
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