China’s Trade Surplus Passes $1 Trillion With Two Months to Spare as October Imports Jump 41.6%

China’s goods trade surplus topped $1 trillion in the first 10 months of the year, customs data released on Tuesday, Nov. 10, showed. CNBC reported it was the fastest the country has reached that mark. The surplus stood at $1.04 trillion through October, against a record $1.2 trillion for all of 2025.

Related: China’s Factory-Gate Prices Rise 5.7% in October, the Fastest Since June 2022, as Consumer Inflation Slows to 0.7%.

What the data showed

Exports rose 35.2% in October from a year earlier to $412.3 billion, according to figures from the General Administration of Customs cited by Euronews. Imports rose 41.6% to $307.1 billion. By a Boston Report calculation from those figures, the October surplus was about $105.2 billion.

Both readings beat forecasts. Economists polled by Reuters expected export growth of 33.5% and import growth of 32%, CNBC reported. A Caixin survey of 11 institutions put the averages at 33.6% and 31.6%.

The import gain was the strongest since May 2021, according to CNBC. Nikkei Asia also described imports as at a five-year high. Surplus growth slowed to a six-month low in October as imports surged, CNBC reported.

AI hardware is driving the numbers

Imports of high-tech products rose 72% by value in October, according to CNBC’s calculations from the official figures. Crude oil imports rose about 41% by value, liquefied natural gas about 50% and coal about 60%.

“Imports were still dominated by AI trade,” Tianchen Xu, a senior economist at the Economist Intelligence Unit, told CNBC.

Caixin reported that much of the export growth came from rising prices rather than shipment volumes. It also reported a sharp slowdown in car exports. Economists at Capital Economics estimated that exports fell 2% from September on a seasonally adjusted basis, CNBC reported.

Trade partners press Beijing

China’s surplus with the European Union reached $310.7 billion from January through October, up from $241.6 billion in the same period last year, Euronews reported. Exports to the bloc rose 24.4% in October while imports fell more than 4%, CNBC reported.

The EU reached an agreement with Beijing last month to limit imports of Chinese hybrid vehicles. Those curbs take effect Dec. 1 and cap imports at 350,000 cars a year, according to CNBC. Brad Setser, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, said the cap is above the 300,000 hybrids China sent to Europe last year but well below a recent annualized pace of 800,000, CNBC reported.

Exports to the United States rose 32.9% from a year earlier in October, and imports from the United States rose nearly 35%, CNBC reported. China’s October surplus with the U.S. was $32.7 billion. The U.S. side of the ledger is covered in The Boston Report’s story on the $105.0 billion U.S. trade deficit in September.

What comes next

President Xi Jinping and President Donald Trump are expected to meet at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Shenzhen, which runs Nov. 18 to 19, Euronews reported. A U.S.-China trade truce extended in September expires in January, CNBC reported.

Yuanliu Hu, an analyst at Citi Research, told CNBC that export growth could slow to 8% in 2027 as favorable comparisons fade and global AI investment moderates. Lynn Song, chief economist for Greater China at ING Bank, said China remains on pace for a record surplus this year.

Beijing’s growth target for the year is 4.5% to 5%. Retail sales grew 1.1% in September, which CNBC said underscored the imbalance in the economy. More coverage is available in the Boston Report economy section and the world news section.

Sources

• CNBC: China’s goods surplus tops $1 trillion for a second year amid calls for Beijing to rebalance trade
• Euronews: China’s trade surplus surpasses $1 trillion as AI boom powers exports
• Caixin Global: China’s Exports Jump on Strong AI Trade
• Nikkei Asia: China exports stay brisk as annual trade surplus tops $1tn

About the reporter: Elena Park is an AI reporter covering business and markets for The Boston Report. This article was produced with AI under our editorial policy. Read our AI and media disclosure.