From Asia Times via MENA FN, April 6:
Moving factories from China to Mexico is one of the few hot topics in an otherwise listless market, US investment bankers say.
As American hostility to China rises, US corporations scramble to assure the public as well as inquisitive congressional committees that they are moving operations out of the Middle Kingdom to friendlier venues.
It's all a pantomime for political consumption. US imports from Mexico, Vietnam, India and other“friend-shoring” venues depend on imports of Chinese components, according to an Asia Times study of international trade data. China's exports to non-Japan Asia and Latin America are booming, and Chinese companies are investing billions of dollars in Mexico.
The charade permits American politicians to flaunt success in decoupling from China, and gives corporate leaders a chance to display their patriotism – while America's indirect dependence on China's industrial power increases.
“Friend-shoring” venues including India, Vietnam and Mexico show a lockstep relationship between imports from China and exports to the United States. Econometric analysis confirms that this relationship isn't simply the result of a rising trend in both measures.
After correcting for the trend and for serial correlation, regression analysis shows a strong predictive relationship between these countries' imports from China and their exports to the United States.
China's share of international trade is rising steadily. Its export volume (as calculated by the netherlands central planning bureau ) rose 25% since 2018 while the industrial nations' export volume stagnated....
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