By Lily Bearings
©2004-2008
The government of China, General Administration of Customs, via the state-controlled Xinhua news, has released data covering its exports of all types of bearings, for December 2008 and the full year.
China's state-volunteered export data is notoriously inaccurate, tending to dramatically understate both the quantity and value. Although the specific numbers may be suspect, the data does offer insight to general trends in volume, growth, and pricing which have proven valuable in terms of general industry analysis.
As the export data indicates, the global economic slowdown is having a strong impact on bearing manufacturers in China, masked somewhat by seasonality in the raw numbers. There are also numerous reports that year-end data is subject to many government "adjustments" needed to show production met levels indicated by the central planners.
Although there is some seasonality apparent in the bearing export data supplied, China's bearing exports are clearly dropping more sharply than in previous years.
The most telling numbers, however, are eBearing.com's own rolling year-on-year figures for export growth. As 2008 wore on, we calculate China's bearing industry -- almost completely dependent upon exports -- suffered a dramatic slowdown which is reflected in the year-on-year growth rate from 2007:
