> truth is the margins for Chinese exporters have collapsed - there was a Chinese industrial profit drop of 10% in may and 5% in June [from comment below]

Truth is someone doesn't know how to read NBS/MoF data.

Decompose Industrial Profit Index, export sector margins private sector / manufacturing have been growing ~3% yoy/ytd. Stuff PRC is driving hard like electronic machinery up 10%, general manufacturing up 7%, autos, computers, electronics, up 4%.

Headline "Industrial Profit Index" down because _domestic_ coal and fossil profit %'s collapsed, something like -50% for coal and -10% for fossil. Coal demand down due to renewable rollout, fossil because cheap RU imports. Energy industrial profit are mostly large SEOs which get's disproportionated weighted in Index by NBS who doesn't publish profit index ex energy -> most exporters private companies increasing profitability gets skewed by headline number. People see Industrial Profit Index down, thinking profits across sectors down, but it's just domestic/SEO energy profit dragging down other sectors whose profit index increasing. Reality is if PRC export to US down, but US imports from countries known to tranship/reroute from PRC up then PRC mostly not cutting margins/absorbing tariffs but diverting.