China stays resilient in first year of Trump 2.0 in World Economy News 23/01/2026 Days before US President Donald Trump marked his first year back in the White House on Tuesday, China released a series of economic data showing signs of resilience against trade pressure from the United States. The world’s second-largest economy reported 5% economic growth for 2025 on Monday, meeting the government’s annual target. Data released last week also showed a record trade surplus of nearly $1.2 trillion for the year. Analysts say the surplus, driven by dumping exports on non-US markets, indicates that Chinese products remain globally competitive on price and that Beijing has managed to cushion the blow of Trump’s trade policies. “[The Trump administration] may have entered the office thinking that they could use their economic leverage to push China in certain policy directions,” said Amanda Hsiao, a China studies director at the Eurasia Group consultancy. “In fact, Beijing has its own pieces of leverage that match Washington’s as well.” Beijing confident in pushing back against Trump Trump’s approach to China is seen as placing less emphasis on ideology and more on economic and technology rivalry, a shift reflected in Washington’s latest National Security Strategy released in December. Kicking off his second term with so-called reciprocal tariffs on countries around the world, Trump soon renewed a tit-for-tat trade war with China as Beijing hit back. The peak of their trade dispute came in April, with the US imposing tariffs of up to 145% on Chinese goods and China, in return, raising its total tariffs to the same level and announcing export controls on rare earth elements. “Basically the two sides had loaded each of their guns and pointed at each other,” said Hsiao, before they realized the scale of the “mutually assured pain” inflicted on their economies. The two sides eventually backed down following a first round of trade talks in May, with tariffs rolled back and currently sitting at around 30% on each other’s products. “Beijing really took the risk of hitting back against Trump. And this approach was vindicated when Washington retreated and opted for a detente,” Hsiao said, adding that Beijing could now think its tough approach was “correct.” Diao Daming, a professor of international studies at Renmin University of China in Beijing, also said compared to Trump’s first term, Beijing has emerged with “greater confidence” in responding to “potential uncertainties from Washington.” On the economic and trade fronts, China has eventually established a degree of “mutual checks and balances” with the US following a year of strategic tug-of-war, he told DW. Strategic calculations behind trade truce From a fierce battle to a cautious trade truce, US-China relations have now moved toward stabilization while the overall strategic competition remains. In 2025, Trump stepped up top level engagement with his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping, including four phone calls and one in-person meeting between the two leaders. Such top-level diplomacy played a critical role in stabilizing the US-China relations over the past year, said Diao, highlighting the importance of dialogue amid their differences. Trump boasted his meeting with Xi in Busan, South Korea, in October was a “12 out of 10,” while Xi urged both sides to focus on the long-term benefits of cooperation and not fall into “a vicious cycle of retaliation.” From a strategic point of view, however, the c