06 November 2019

U.S.-China Trade Continues To Shrink in Tariff War

The carnage from the U.S-China tariff war continued through September 2019, where trade data for the month just released by the U.S. Census Bureau indicates year-over-year declines from September 2018's tariff war-reduced figures.

The following chart captures that observation as measured by the year-over-year growth rate of the exchange-rate adjusted value of trade between the U.S. and China, where both China and the U.S. fall well within negative growth territory.

Year Over Year Growth Rate of U.S.-China Trade, January 1986 - September 2019

Looking next at the combined value of the goods and services the U.S. and China traded with each other, we find the gap between the pre-trade war trend and the trailing twelve month average of the value of goods exchanged between the U.S. and China expanded to $12.8 billion in September 2019. Since March 2018, when the tariff war began, the cumulative loss in the total value of trade between the two nations has grown to $86.9 billion.

Combined Value of U.S. Exports to China and Imports from China, January 2008 - September 2019

Both the U.S. and China are being negatively impacted by the tariff war.

References

U.S. Census Bureau. Trade in Goods with China. Accessed 5 November 2019.

Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System. China / U.S. Foreign Exchange Rate. G.5 Foreign Exchange Rates. Accessed 5 November 2019.