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In the months following China’s retaliatory introduction of tariffs on U.S. soybean exports, both traditional and social media were abuzz with the screeching sound of ‘analysts’ claiming that Trump Administration trade war with China is a boon to Vladimir Putin’s Russian economy.
Behold this from the
- Venerable CFR (albeit intellectually vulnerable): https://www.cfr.org/blog/trumps-trade-war-china-makes-russia-great-again and
- WSJ: https://www.wsj.com/articles/russia-exploits-u-s-china-trade-tensions-to-sell-more-soybeans-11550745001 and
- Bloomberg: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-05-17/china-buys-record-amount-of-russian-soy-as-it-shuns-u-s-growers and more Bloomberg https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-11-07/china-turns-to-russia-in-search-to-replace-u-s-soybeans and
- And a good collection of sources across the media here: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2019/1/7/1824363/-Is-Russia-profiting-from-Trump-tariffs-on-China and
- The Hill: https://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/388178-china-buys-record-amount-of-russian-soybeans-amid-halt-on-us-imports and
- A more somber and sober analysis from Carnegie Moscow Center: https://carnegie.ru/commentary/77443 and so on
Alas, given that Russia supplies less than 1% of Chinese imports of soybeans, it might take a major Congressional investigation and a few PoliSci ‘Russia experts’ to get serious imaginary beef on the Trump Administration’s alleged Russia-benefiting policies. Here is the data from … well… Bloomberg, via Global macro Monitor (https://global-macro-monitor.com/2019/05/14/who-pays-the-tariffs/) showing that Russia is hardly a major winner from Trump’s Trade Wars when it comes to soybeans:
- There is no dramatic massive rise in Russian exports of soybeans to China in 2018, and some dip in 2019.
- 2018 increase – moderate – came in after 2017 moderate decrease.
- Russian exports of soybeans to China have been rising-falling-rising very gently since 2013.
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