EU faces ‘China shock’ as EV imports drive Beijing’s record surplus with bloc

The EU is experiencing a prolonged “China shock” as a flood of Chinese EVs into Europe helped push Beijing to a record surplus with the bloc. New data showed China’s trade surplus – where its exports to the EU exceeded imports from the bloc – was $83bn (£61bn) in the first three months of 2026. China sold goods worth about $148bn to the EU in the first quarter, but imported just $65bn from the bloc, according to analysis of 2026 customs data by Mercator Institute for China Studies (Merics). The surplus for the whole of 2025 stood at €360bn . The record was driven in part by Europeans’ apparent unstoppable appetite for Chinese cars , including BYD which has declared it wants to become the world’s biggest automaker. Sales of Chinese electric and hybrid cars almost doubled from $11bn (£8.1bn) in the first three months of 2025 to $20.6bn for the same period this year. This accounted for a third of the value of all Chinese EV exports. When the UK, Norway and Switzerland are included, Europe accounts for 42% of Chinese sales of EVs, which have seen a 50% surge in March in the wake of the Iran war. Merics, which crunched the numbers along with Chinese trade site Soapbox, said China’s economy had so far shown resilience in the face of the Iran war with the “largest quarterly growth figures … since 2022”. Soapbox figures released last week showed that exports from the EU to China fell 16.2% in February, with pork shipments notably in decline. …