I hear you, and I don’t care | The weekly recap

Chinese authorities are done apologizing, if they ever started.

That’s been one of the main themes from my conversations in Beijing this week – many of which focused on messaging from the new 15th Five-Year Plan and remarks by Chinese officials at the China Development Forum (CDF).

• The CDF, for the uninitiated, is an annual gathering where Chinese officials tout the wonders of China’s economy and the huge opportunities it presents to foreign companies – or at least that’s what it used to be.

While I wasn’t at CDF myself, the folks I’ve spoken with who attended almost universally noted that the tone from officials was notably matter-of-fact, largely focused on trade, and pretty much boiled down to:

• “Yes, we’ve got an export-oriented growth model. Deal with it.”

The official verbiage was, of course, less direct – but only slightly. Premier Li Qiang, for example, in his keynote speech at the CDF, at least padded the message with this:

• “We take our trading partners’ concerns seriously and we are ready to work with all parties to promote the sound and balanced development of trade.”

But only before proceeding to state that:

• “China’s imports and exports represent fair trade conducted within a rules-based framework.”
• “China’s competitive advantages have not been achieved through subsidies and protection, but through…the hard work and dedication of the Chinese people and Chinese enterprises.”

As one European diplomat put it to me, the message was: “Quit whining that our companies are more competitive than yours.”

What I find remarkable about this messaging isn't what it says about China's fundamental approach to economic growth.

• We've been saying for months that China's plan is to double down on industrial innovation and upgrading, which almost by definition means continued reliance on export markets to absorb excess production.

What’s striking is the pointed shift to a much more unapologetic attitude.

• China's leaders clearly understand that much of the rest of the world is deeply concerned about the influx of Chinese goods hitting their markets.
• But rather than seeking to assuage those concerns – and avoid future fits of trade tension and retaliation – they seem to be daring other countries to do something about it.

The bet seems to be that most countries, or trading blocs, won’t get their acts together enough to materially push back against China’s export juggernaut.

• Even the US tariffs on Chinese goods – unprecedented in recent history – have only succeed in diverting low-value manufactures (think toys, textiles, and fast fashion) away from the US and toward new markets.
• They’ve had less impact on higher-value exports to the US – either because those goods were never sold there at scale (i.e. NEVs) or were exempt from the tariff regime anyway (i.e. smartphones and medical equipment).

It seems to me, then, that China is likely to continue pushing its export machine to its absolute theoretical limit – and I think we still have a way to go until we reach that limit.

• That means that China’s exporters can continue capturing wallet in a range of new markets, both by riding overall global demand growth and – crucially – by eating into the market share of exporters from developed economies.

The upshot will be that despite the loud – and growing – complaints from other countries, China’s export model will prove more sustainable than is commonly assumed. 

• And until other countries take action, rather than simply complaining, Chinese officials will happily stay the course.

As always, if you want help thinking through what this all means for you, get in touch and we can set something up.

Andrew Polk, Partner and Co-founder, Trivium China

What you missed

Econ and finance

On March 20, the Ministry of Commerce together with eight other ministries unveiled a policy push to boost inbound tourism, focusing on:

• Presenting a more dynamic and appealing image of China through social media
• Improving foreign-language services across restaurants, hotels, tourist sites, healthcare, and public services
• Expanding unilateral visa-free access and optimizing transit visa-free policies

Corporates

According to recent earnings reports, China’s leading new energy vehicle (NEV) startups are finally becoming profitable.

• Xiaomi’s spectacularly successful NEV unit generated RMB 900 million in profit in 2025, just two years after its founding – an industry record.
• Leapmotor, China’s bestselling NEV upstart, saw 2025 annual sales quadruple from 2023 levels and posted its first-ever annual profit of RMB 540 million.
• Xpeng and Nio, though still loss-making, both recorded their first quarterly profits in Q4 2025, driven by a surge in sales volumes.

On Wednesday, state-owned COSCO Shipping announced it is resuming new bookings to the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar, Kuwait, and Iraq – sparking speculation it would become the first major carrier to resume shipments through the Strait of Hormuz.

• Within hours, COSCO clarified that it will not be transiting the Strait.

• Instead, it will route containers to two UAE east coast ports outside the Persian Gulf and then move goods overland via bonded land transport corridors for onward shipment.
• European shipping giants CMA CGM and Maersk announced similar multimodal alternatives on March 11 and March 18, respectively – putting COSCO weeks behind some of its largest Western competitors.

Commodities

On Monday, the macro planner (NDRC) announced temporary price controls as part of its updated national fuel price ceilings, limiting gasoline and diesel price increases to roughly half of expected levels.

• Folks still face an over-10% price hike at the pump – but that’s a far cry from the roughly 25% increase that the NDRC’s pricing formula would usually dictate.
• This is the first time the NDRC has used this power – including in 2022, when oil prices soared following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Business environment

On March 22, Han Wenxiu, the senior official overseeing day-to-day operations at the Central Commission for Financial and Economic Affairs (CCFEA) – the Party’s top economic policymaking body – told the China Development Forum (CDF):

• “After years of effort, China’s indigenous innovation capacity has passed a critical inflection point, making it difficult for external forces to derail our development”

• That’s a big change in framing – as recently as 2023, Xi Jinping warned that US-led technology restrictions posed “unprecedented severe challenges” to China’s development.
• Han’s remarks follow a broader uptick in official messaging highlighting progress in overcoming foreign technology chokepoints. For example, on March 5, Minister of Science and Technology Yin Hejun stated that China had made “new breakthroughs” in core chip technologies – though provided no details.

Foreign affairs

On Wednesday, China’s Ministry of Commerce (MofCom) released its final determination in its trade investigation against Mexico, finding that: “The measures under investigation…constitute trade and investment barriers.”

• China launched the investigation in September after Mexico announced plans to hike tariffs on imports from non-free-trade-agreement (FTA) partners.

• While the tariffs – which took effect on January 1 – don’t single out any individual country, China, by far Mexico’s largest non-FTA supplier, bears the brunt.
• The tariffs landed ahead of Mexico-US discussions on reviewing the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA).

US-China

On Thursday, Commerce Minister Wang Wentao met with US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer on the sidelines of the WTO’s 14th Ministerial Conference in Yaoundé, Cameroon.

• The discussion looked largely steady-as-she-goes following the last round of China-US trade negotiations in Paris on March 15-16.
• However, Wang raised “serious concerns” over Washington’s recent Section 301 investigations into multiple trade partners – including China –regarding overcapacity and forced labor concerns.
• Beijing also fired back with two trade probes of its own – one targeting US measures that disrupt global supply chains, another targeting restrictions on green trade.

On Thursday, US President Donald Trump announced on Truth Social that he had rescheduled his long-awaited China trip to May 14-15.

• Trump’s visit was originally scheduled for March 31-April 2, but he postponed it to focus on Iran.
• Trump said that he also planned to host Xi Jinping and his wife, Peng Liyuan, for a “reciprocal visit” later this year and that he: “Look[s] very much forward to spending time with President Xi in what will be, I am sure, a Monumental Event.”

As always, it was a busy week in China.

• Thank goodness Trivium China is here to make sure you don’t miss any of the developments that matter.