China's June export growth to U.S. slows sharply - China customs

BEIJING (Reuters) - China's exports to the United States in June rose 3.8 percent from a year earlier in yuan terms, 23.8 percentage points lower than the growth rate seen a year earlier, the country's customs agency said late on Monday.

For the first half of this year, customs said China's exports to the United States rose 5.4 percent from a year earlier compared with 19.3 percent for same period in 2017.

The customs agency did not provide exact values for June and January-June exports or say how exports to the U.S. fared in dollar-denominated terms.

Beijing and Washington are set to impose imports tariffs against each other on July 6 amid an escalating trade dispute that has spooked investors and has driven Chinese stocks and the yuan lower.

China is due to publish preliminary June trade data on July 13.

(Reporting by Zhang Min and Stella Qiu in Beijing and Lee Chyen Yee in Singapore; writing by Se Young Lee; Editing by Andrew Roche and Richard Borsuk)