Foreign trade containers are stacked in a container yard at Qingdao Port in Qingdao, China, on May 14, 2024.
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This is according to a report that showed only 27% of companies surveyed in the US plan to expand in China.
“European companies are clearly less anxious than their US counterparts,” said the report, led by Ana Boata, head of economic research at Allianz Trade.
The Allianz Trade survey surveyed more than 3,000 companies in China, France, Germany, Italy, Poland, Spain, the UK and the US about their outlook for global trade in 2024.
The trade survey found that more than a third of respondents plan to expand into China, while just 11% said they plan to scale back.
“China remains an important supplier to the world, and complete decoupling from China appears difficult, if not impossible,” the Allianz Trade report said.
Meanwhile, in China, Chinese companies are becoming more optimistic about exporting to other countries.
More than one in 10 exporters from China, the second-largest exporter to the United States after Mexico, expected exports to increase by more than 10%.
This is higher than other countries, which were mainly expecting a 2% to 5% increase in exports, according to the report’s data.
“Chinese exporters are more optimistic than before.” [other countries] “The survey shows that,” said Francoise Huang, senior economist for Asia Pacific at Allianz Trade.
“Last year was a bad year for exports overall, with a global trade recession, so we think our survey respondents are particularly optimistic,” Huang said Thursday on CNBC’s “Squawk Box. Asia,” he said.
While companies may not be able to completely separate their supply chains from China, diversification remains a consideration.
“Companies looking to diversify their supply chains are focusing on ASEAN and also looking at the rest of the Asia-Pacific region,” Huang told CNBC. I mentioned the sphere.
The report says that while exporters may be more optimistic in 2024, they are increasingly concerned about the geopolitical situation and risks related to shortages of inputs, labor and finance. It was shown that
Some 73% of those surveyed said risks related to politics and protectionism were their biggest concern. According to the report, exporters remain concerned about supply chain disruptions, with “31% of respondents ranking transportation risks as their top three risks, and 28% including the risk of input shortages. It is said that
About 48% of U.S. exporters who manufacture in China or have suppliers in China say they consider Asia Pacific and Latin American countries in their diversification efforts.
“Relocation within the same region and nearshoring appear to be a positive trend,” the report said, with only 5% of respondents believing the reshoring trend will reverse in the next two years. , added that it expects an increase of almost 30%.
The war between Russia and Ukraine remains the biggest geopolitical risk that companies expect to disrupt supply chains, while the trade war between the US and China threatens to disrupt long supply chains and drive more than 50% of overseas production. It has become the biggest threat to companies.
