China's exports sink, but factory investment rises

[May 12, 2009]  SHANGHAI (AP) -- China's exports slumped for the sixth straight month amid warnings that weak overseas demand was hindering a recovery, even as government spending helped boost factory investment.

The 22.6 percent drop in exports in April from a year earlier, to $91.9 billion, was bigger than March's 17 percent drop and larger than forecasts. It suggests China's trade sector has seen scant relief from the prolonged drought in demand brought on by the global downturn.

"These figures show we cannot be optimistic about the future trends for exports," the Commerce Ministry said in a statement posted on its Web site that amounted to a lament over the lack of a turnaround in demand for Chinese products.

"We will have to view the problems and risks more seriously, expect that the crisis will persist a bit longer and take more complete measures ... to help stabilize foreign trade," it said.

On the positive side, Beijing reported that investment in factories and property development jumped 30.5 percent during the first four months of the year to 3.71 trillion yuan ($543.2 billion), as banks kept up a steady flow of lending for government stimulus projects.

Chinese investors appeared to take the trade data in stride, snapping up property shares and other blue chips and pushing the benchmark Shanghai Stock Exchange up 1.5 percent on Tuesday to 2,618.17.

There were some glimmers of hope even in the trade figures, which can fluctuate wildly from month to month.

Recent increases from the previous month in exports of clothing, shoes, plastics and other labor-intensive consumer goods suggest some recovery in demand. And surging imports of iron ore, crude oil and other commodities suggest that China's domestic demand may be stabilizing.

"While there is no sign of a recovery in the April data, the pace of deterioration was much milder than it was in late 2008, and the bottoming of exports could happen soon," said Alastair Chan, an economist with Moody's Economy.com in Sydney.

Overall, China's imports remained anemic, falling 23 percent in April to $78.8 billion, the Customs Administration reported, putting China's trade surplus -- or the amount exports exceed imports -- at $13.1 billion. That compared with an $18.6 billion surplus in March.

The surplus with the United States edged higher to $10.6 billion in April from $10.2 billion in March, as exports dropped 15.7 percent from a year earlier to $17.2 billion while imports fell 17.4 percent to $6.6 billion.

China's surplus with the EU, its biggest trading partner, fell to $7.4 billion in April from $8 billion in March, while its deficit with Japan was $2.75 billion.

Beijing is channeling hundreds of billions of dollars into construction and other projects meant to boost demand and create jobs and recent improvements in housing and auto sales, relatively firm retail sales growth and other data have raised hopes that the economy may be poised for a turnaround.

But the Commerce Ministry's report bemoaned the drag posed by weak exports on the economy, and the losses of jobs both for factory workers and for white-collar employees hit by cutbacks in foreign-trade related jobs.

"Weakening overseas demand, now and in the near future is affecting the overall economy," it said, urging further measures to boost exports.

China's banks issued about 5.2 trillion yuan ($757 billion) in new loans in January-April and the massive spending on construction, factory equipment and other fixed assets is likely to continue to rise as the government battles the slowdown, analysts said.

"Although much of the new bank lending has not yet turned into faster growth in economic activity, because of the time lag between lending and actual demand, we do expect fixed investment to accelerate in the coming months," Tao Wang, an economist with UBS, said in a report Monday.

"As a result, we expect orders to rise and industrial production to rebound," she said.

[Associated Press; By ELAINE KURTENBACH]

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