Chinese imports collapsed 19.9% YoY in January, missing expectations of a modest 3.2% drop by the most since Lehman. This is the biggest YoY drop since May 2009 and worst January since the peak of the financial crisis. Exports tumbled 3.3% YoY (missing expectations of 5.9% surge) for the worst January since 2009. Combined this led to a $60.03 billion trade surplus in January - the largest ever. But apart from these massive imbalances, everything is awesome in the global economy (oh apart from The Baltic Dry at record lows, Iron Ore near record lows, oil prices crashed, and the other engine of the world economy - USA USA USA - imploding). Ugly... Uglier... Leaving the largest trade surplus ever... * * * China exports to Japan down 20% - the price of pacifism in a currency war pic.twitter.com/dSiPw7Kumk — Tom Orlik (@TomOrlik) https://twitter.com/TomOrlik/status/564266567924723712!function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0],p=/^http:/.test(d.location)?'http':'https';if(!d.getElementById(id)){js=d.createElement(s);js.id=id;js.src=p+"://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js";fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js,fjs);}}(document,"script","twitter-wjs"); China import fall partly weak demand, partly falling prices. Oil imports stay on trend (2/3) pic.twitter.com/LCJ1n8r2xg — Tom Orlik (@TomOrlik) https://twitter.com/TomOrlik/status/564266239426433025!function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0],p=/^http:/.test(d.location)?'http':'https';if(!d.getElementById(id)){js=d.createElement(s);js.id=id;js.src=p+"://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js";fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js,fjs);}}(document,"script","twitter-wjs"); * * * We look forward to seeing the variance between China exports to US and US imports from China... Charts: Bloomberg