China recorded a small trade surplus in March.
The Government said yesterday the surplus of $140 million last month came after the $7.3 billion deficit recorded in February, the first in 11 months.
Exports in March rose 35.8% from the same month a year earlier, up from February’s 2.4% (which was impacted by the Lunar New Year/Spring festival holidays. .
Imports were up 27.3%, from the 19.4% rise recorded in February.
Rising prices for raw materials such as oil, iron ore and coal, helped push up the value of imports.
For the first quarter, China posted a trade deficit of US$1.02 billion with exports rising 26.5% year on year and imports were up 32.6%.
It was the first quarterly trade deficit in six years.
The quarter’s trade deficit was due to the strong rise in imports, the General Administration of Customs said in a statement.
But March’s strong rise in exports showed no sign of any impact from the Japanese disasters of March 11, nor the nuclear crisis.
And China will move to quarter on quarter GDP figures, as well as year on year from the release of data for the March quarter on Friday.
More evidence of the approaching slump in the Japanese economy with the first sentiment survey taken since the March 11 disasters showing a sharp fall in confidence among workers in the services sector.
While the Bank of Japan’s Tankan survey of business sentiment among mostly manufacturers was partially impacted by the disasters, the so-called economy watchers’ index was whacked by the triple disasters and dropped by half in March.
The survey is conducted by the government and measures sentiment among service employees close to consumers, including restaurateurs, hoteliers and hairdressers.
It fell to 27.7 from 48.4 in March, a cabinet office survey showed.
As in all sentiment surveys, 50 is the dividing line between pessimism and optimism, so this survey showed service workers were mildly pessimistic in February, but by the end of last month that has turned into a huge loss of confidence, which isn’t surprising given the impact of the twin disasters of March 11, and then the debilitating Fukushima nuclear crisis which continues.
Such levels of pessimism have not been seen since early 2009 when Japan was struggling with its worst recession since the second world war.
The sharp decline in sentiment also reflects the self-restraint, or jishuku, exercised by many Japanese following the earthquake and tsunami that has so far left more than 27,000 people dead or missing, as well as the disruption to distribution it caused.
It’s no wonder service workers are worried, they face job losses as business cuts costs to match lower operating levels.
Investment bank Nomura produced research on Friday that suggested over 80,000 people might lose their jobs in the most damaged areas in Miyagi, Iwate and Fukushima prefectures.
The estimate, which covers 38 municipalities in the affected areas, is based on the assumption that the disaster will have the same impact on the employment situation as the 1995 Kobe quake did.
But the institute said its calculation has not taken into account the effects of the quake and ensuing tsunami on jobs in the farm and fisheries sectors that had been thriving in the coastal areas until the disaster devastated farming land and fishing ports. As well, the estimate has not factored in the effects of the disaster-triggered crisis at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.
So the job losses will end up much higher and push the country’s unemployment rate back over 5%.
This loss of confidence is supported by monthly sales figures for McDonald’s which said on Friday its sales in Japan in March dropped 7.3% from a year earlier on a same-store basis.
That was an even bigger fall than in November 2009 when sales dropped 6%. The number of customers in March fell 6.9% after a 14% jump in February.
McDonald’s has suspended operations at its stores across most of the Tohoku region on the northeast coast of Japan which took the brunt of the of March 11 magnitude-9.0 quake and tsunamis.
The company has also been hit by power blackouts in and around Tokyo which has cut opening hours.
There was one bit of good news on Friday: big Japanese carmakers have revealed restarts for their Japanese factories.
Toyota will resume car production at all its plants in Japan at half capacity from April 18 to 27. Nissan also said it would start up domestic production at half capacity from April 11. Honda said it will resume operations as well but it will take two to three months to get back to full capacity.
Thursday night’s quake worried Japanese, causing new pressures on consumers across the country, especially in and around Tokyo.
And figures out on Friday showed that Japan’s current account surplus rose 3.0% from a year earlier in February.
The current account surplus totalled 1.641 trillion yen ($US19.32 billion) in the month. That was short of market forecasts for a surplus of 1.743 trillion yen,
Both government and private payments are included in the calculation.
