June export growth to US slows sharply

CHINA’S exports to the United States in June rose 3.8 percent from a year earlier in yuan terms, 23.8 percentage points lower than the growth rate seen a year earlier, the country’s customs agency said late Monday.

For the first half of this year, customs said China’s exports to the United States rose 5.4 percent from a year earlier compared with 19.3 percent for same period in 2017. It did not provide exact values for June and January-June exports or say how exports to the United States fared in U.S. dollar-denominated terms. China is due to publish preliminary June trade data July 13.

Commerce minister promises wider market access

THE country will significantly widen market access and oppose any kind of protectionism, Chinese Commerce Minister Zhong Shan said in an article published in the People’s Daily on Monday.

Zhong said economic globalization is an irreversible trend and that China will continue to defend the global multilateral trading system.

Honda vehicle sales down 6%

HONDA Motor Co.’s vehicle sales in China fell 6 percent in June from a year earlier to 107,985 units, the company said yesterday.

This is the fifth straight monthly decline in sales for the company which faced a quality issue in its popular CR-V sport utility vehicle. Honda, which has resolved the issue, saw a 15.3-percent drop in its May sales. During the first half of 2018, sales volume by the Tokyo-based automaker in the world’s biggest auto market fell 6.4 percent from the same period a year earlier to 609,100 vehicles.

Xiaomi says US ties will smooth market entry

XIAOMI Corp. is pressing ahead with plans to enter the United States next year, saying its U.S. connections should help the consumer-focused smartphone maker skirt the resistance met by some other Chinese firms.

Senior vice president Wang Xiang said yesterday that the U.S. market was “very attractive” and that the firm was adding engineering resources to develop versions of its handsets that are compatible with U.S. cellphone networks. Wang said the Sino-U.S. tensions introduced “uncertainty” but downplayed its impact on the firm’s U.S. expansion plans, highlighting relationships with suppliers such as U.S. chipmaker Qualcomm and Alphabet Inc. “Next year we hope we can do something there,” Wang said.