Results for 2025 risk further unsettling economies about China’s trade practices and overcapacity, and their own over-reliance on Chinese products
China has reported a strong export run in 2025 with a record trillion-dollar surplus, as its producers brace for three more years of a Trump administration set on slowing the manufacturing powerhouse by shifting US orders to other markets.
Beijing’s resilience to renewed tariff tensions since Donald Trump returned to the US presidency last January has emboldened Chinese firms to shift their focus to south-east Asia, Africa and Latin America to offset US duties.
With Beijing looking to exports to counteract a prolonged property slump and sluggish domestic demand, the record surplus risks further unsettling economies concerned about China’s trade practices and overcapacity, as well as their own over-reliance on key Chinese products.
The full-year trade surplus came in at $1.189tn – a figure on par with the GDP of a top-20 economy globally like Saudi Arabia – customs data showed on Wednesday, having broken the trillion-dollar ceiling for the first time in November.
