Chinese trade surplus with US grows

Ahead of a visit by Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner to China this week for trade talks, China on Tuesday announced that its global trade surplus in 2011 shrank by 14.5 percent compared to 2010.

China’s global trade surplus stood at $155 billion in 2011, a decrease of $26 billion, the General Administration of Customs said.

But buried deep in the statistics translated from Chinese, it becomes clear that the trade surplus with the United States has grown. The trade imbalance for 2011 was $202 billion, compared to $181 billion in 2010.

Total foreign trade was valued at $3.6 trillion, including a $174 billion increase in exports.

The Treasury Department late last year once again declined to name China a “currency manipulator,” a step that could lead to trade sanctions, especially if a Senate-passed bill clears the House.

Presidential candidate Mitt Romney has said he would name China a currency manipulator in order to combat its undervalued currency, which makes Chinese exports cheaper and U.S. imports into China prohibitively expensive.