In the nearly 40 years she has spent in trade, Amy Magnus has never seen retailers hoarding so much inventory.
Warehouses throughout the United States are at record capacity with Chinese imports of all kinds - microwaves, vacuum cleaner filters, swimwear, furniture - stacked to the ceiling, according to Magnus, who heads the National Customs Brokers & Forwarders Association of America, whose members work with over 250,000 importers and exporters.
The buying binge is also evident in recent data from the National Retail Federation (NRF) and Hackett Associates, which show imports at major U.S. retail container ports surged 13.6 percent to a record 2.04million containers in October. This helped push the U.S. trade deficit with China to a record high.
Retail inventory piles up, U.S.-China trade deficit widens
U.S. retail inventory grew at a faster pace this year between January and October, according to surveys collected by the U.S. Census Bureau. In that same period, the politically sensitive trade deficit between China and the United States has widened, hitting a record $43.1 billion in October.
The U.S. and China have since agreed to a 90-day trade war truce until March 2, but supply chain firms and vendors said this has not slowed buying or forward orders because the tariffs could still be hiked.
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