China: Trade improving, slowdown stabilizing

Containers are stacked at the Yangshan Deep Water Port in Shanghai. (Bloomberg)

China’s commerce ministry said that the nation’s trade growth is improving, adding to a rebound in lending in signaling that a slowdown in the world’s second- biggest economy may stabilize.

China can achieve a 10 percent gain in exports and imports this year if the world economy doesn’t worsen further, spokesman Shen Danyang said at a briefing in Beijing Tuesday. Trade growth improved in June and had “sound momentum,” Shen said.

Global trade confidence is so far weathering Europe’s sovereign-debt crisis, according to a survey of exporters, importers and traders released Tuesday by HSBC Holdings Plc. In China, an interest-rate cut in June, a jump in new loans in May and declines in the yuan against the dollar highlight government efforts to aid manufacturers and reverse the economic slide.

“The economy will continue to face strong headwinds from the softness in both external and domestic demand,” said Andrew Polk, an economist in Beijing for the New York-based Conference Board, a research agency.

The yuan traded at 6.3647 per dollar as of 11:12 a.m. in Shanghai, down about 1 percent this year.

A leading index for China’s economy rose in May, the Conference Board said in an e-mailed statement Tuesday, citing increases in lending and real-estate activity.

In the HSBC survey, some 71 percent of exporters, importers and traders indicated that they expect trade volumes to be unchanged or increase in the next six months. The bank cited a survey of 5,800 enterprises in 20 countries from April 10 to June 1.

(Bloomberg)