China Claims to Surpass U.S. as World's Largest Goods Trader

The latest world trade figures shows China has surpassed the US as the world’s largest trader.  In 2013, exports rose 7.9% to $2.21 trillion and imports rose 7.3% to $1.95 trillion according to official figures. The total trade figures increased by 7.6% to $4.15 trillion.

According to Richard Martin, managing director of IMA Asia, the current global recovery isn’t “normal” and investors shouldn’t expect all of Asia’s export engine to fire up in a regular fashion.

“Traditionally, when the west recovers, [China] exports will get a lift from strong consumer driven recovery in the Europe and United States. But that’s not the case now. European consumers are still deleveraging, there’s a bit of shyness still there in the US consumers, so that means you don’t get a big factory run up,” Martin told CNBC.

Billionaire George Soros warned last week that China’s potential economic slowdown is the greatest uncertainty in the Global economy. “There is an unresolved self-contradiction in China’s current policies: restarting the furnaces also reignites exponential debt growth, which cannot be sustained for much longer than a couple of years,” Soros wrote.