Trade between China and the European Union increased by around 5 per cent in 2025, even as political tensions and regulatory disputes between the two sides continued to intensify.
Bilateral trade reached $749.3 billion (€642 billion) between January and November 2025, up 5.4 per cent compared with the same period in 2024, according to figures published on January 4 by China’s General Administration of Customs (GAC).
In yuan terms, China’s total imports and exports amounted to 41.21 trillion yuan (€5.82 trillion) in the first 11 months of the year, representing a 3.6 per cent year-on-year increase, the GAC said. Export growth drove the expansion, while imports rose only marginally.
During the same period, the European Union remained China’s second-largest trading partner after ASEAN, the economic organisation of South-East Asian countries, with bilateral trade totalling 5.37 trillion yuan (€658 billion). Trade between China and the United States, by contrast, fell sharply, declining 16.9 per cent year on year.
The continued expansion of China–EU trade took place as the US imposed tariffs on a wide range of countries, including both China and the EU member states.
EU officials have acknowledged that the measures contributed to a broader effort by the bloc to diversify parts of its trade away from the US.
Figures published in December by Eurostat, the EU’s statistical office, showed that in October 2025, EU exports to China fell 3.3 per cent and imports were down 4.4 per cent compared with October 2024. The EU, nevertheless, continued to run a large trade deficit with China, which stood at €32.5 billion.
Trade with the US also declined on a monthly basis, with EU exports down 14.7 per cent year on year, while imports from the US increased 4.4 per cent.
According to the European Commission, China is the EU’s third-largest trading partner for goods and services after the US and the UK and is its second-largest partner for trade in goods alone.
The EC has repeatedly warned, though, that the relationship is increasingly unbalanced. It has cited asymmetries in market access and the impact of China’s industrial policies, arguing that they create distortions with negative spillovers for trading partners, an assessment also referenced by the International Monetary Fund.
Separately, the European Parliament Research Service said that the EU and China together account for nearly 30 per cent of global trade, while reiterating the bloc’s definition of China as a “partner, competitor and systemic rival”.
The EP also pointed to rising trade tensions following US tariff announcements. It noted that China introduced export controls on rare-earth elements in April and October last year, while a second package of measures was later suspended until November 2026.
Against this backdrop, the EC is moving ahead with several regulatory initiatives. It is expected in mid-January to propose changes to its Cybersecurity Act, potentially allowing EU-wide restrictions in certain sectors.
At the same time, work continues on an Industrial Accelerator Act, championed by Executive Vice-President of the EC for Prosperity and Industrial Strategy, Stéphane Séjourné. That aims to strengthen local production and impose additional conditions on foreign companies investing in the EU. The proposal has been delayed and remains under discussion within the EC.
Chinese business groups have criticised the EU’s enforcement of the Foreign Subsidies Regulation, arguing that investigations have disproportionately targeted Chinese companies and warning against overly broad interpretations of what it says constitutes a foreign subsidy.
Tensions have also extended to trade defence measures. Beijing ended 2025 by announcing tariffs on EU dairy products and safeguard measures on imported beef, while signalling opposition to the EU’s Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism.
