China's headline growth in imports unexpectedly stalled in April and exports were weaker-than-expected, raising doubts about the strength of the rebound in the world's second-biggest economy.
The trade data on Thursday was the first of a flurry of economic indicators to be released this week - inflation, producer prices, industrial output, fixed asset investment and retail sales are all due on Friday - which had been expected to show a month-on-month improvement in both foreign and domestic demand.
"Both export and import figures gave the market a downside surprise," said Jiang Chao, an analyst at Guotai Junan Securities, in Shanghai.
"We had expected China's export growth to reach a trough by the end of the second quarter, but now I think we will have to revise down our trade forecast for the full year."
Annual growth in imports last month was just 0.3 percent, far below expectations for an 11 percent increase in a Reuters poll and also weaker than the 5.3 percent year-on-year rise in March. However, the slowdown in headline imports was magnified by a sharp fall in commodities prices in the past year.
Exports were also softer than expected, growing by 4.9 percent in April from a year earlier, compared with a forecast of 8.5 percent and March's rise of 8.9 percent.
That left the country with a trade surplus of $18.4 billion in April, compared with a forecast of $8.5 billion and March's $5.35 billion. Commerce Minister Chen Deming said last week that the April trade surplus would be around $10 billion.
Trade figures from the second quarter tend to give a clearer picture of the emerging trend for the year, given the volatility in first-quarter numbers distorted annually by shifts in the Lunar New Year holidays.
Asian shares fell after the data and the Australian dollar [AUD= 1.0106 
Slowdown Bites
Hurt by a recession in Europe and a patchy economic recovery in the United States - China's two biggest trading partners -export growth has slumped to single-digit levels this year, a long way from growth of more than 20 percent seen in 2010.
To cope with the slowdown, China has tilted policy away from containing inflation and towards supporting growth. Beijing has been aiming for its total trade to grow at an average annual pace of 10 percent in the years between 2011 and 2015.
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