California’s merchandise export trade was valued at $15.619 billion in December 2025, according to a Beacon Economics’ analysis of the latest statistics released by the U.S. Census Bureau’s Foreign Trade Division. That represented a respectable 4.3% gain over the $14.977 billion in exports the state recorded in December 2024.

Over the same period, however, overall U.S. exports increased by 7.8% to $179.036 billion from $166.072 in the previous December. As a result, California’s share of the nation’s merchandise export trade shrank to 8.7% from 9.0% one year earlier.

Exports of California’s manufactured products in December edged lower by a nominal 0.2% year-over-year to $9.306 billion from $9.325 billion. Meanwhile, the state’s shipments abroad of non-manufactured commodities surged by 24.9% to $2.349 billion from $1.881 billion. Re-exports rose by 5.1% to $3.965 billion from $3.771 billion in December 2024.

For all of 2025, California’s merchandise export trade totaled $188.404 billion, up 2.8% from $183.343 one year earlier.

“In a state commonly associated with all things high-tech, it is worth noting that shipments abroad of agricultural commodities soared by 28.4% on an annual basis even as exports of manufactured goods faltered,” said Jock O’Connell, Beacon Economics’ International Trade Advisor.

California accounted for one-sixth of all U.S. merchandise imports in December.

The U.S. Commerce Department reports that California was again the nation’s leading state-of-destination for imported goods. The state’s 16.7% share of all U.S. merchandise imports in December was valued at $47.189 billion, an 11.8% jump from the $42.214 billion imported into California in December 2024.  

• Manufactured imports in December were up 14.6% to $43.183 billion from $37.668 billion one year earlier.  
• Non-manufactured imports in December were valued at $4.007 billion, down by 11.9% from the $4.546 billion in non-manufactured goods the state imported in December 2024.   

In 2025, California accounted for 14.3% of all U.S. merchandise imports. The state’s share for the year amounted to $488.219 billion, marginally down from $491.478 billion in 2024, when the state’s share of all U.S. imports stood at 15.0%.

Please note that Beacon Economics has long taken a skeptical view of the federal government’s state-of-destination statistics. The data’s fundamental shortcoming is that they capture not just goods consumed by California residents or used by California businesses but also a sizable quantity of imported merchandise that is offloaded at California ports but is bound for markets elsewhere in the country.

A CLOSER LOOK AT THE NUMBERS

As always, Beacon Economics advises against reading too much into month-to-month fluctuations in state export statistics, especially when focusing on specific commodities or destinations. Significant variations can occur due to unusual developments or exceptional one-off trades and may not be indicative of underlying trends. For that reason, Beacon Economics compares the latest three months for which data are available (i.e., October -December) with the corresponding period one year earlier. Please note that the numbers cited in this report are nominal values.

LEADING EXPORT COMMODITIES

The table below displays the latest year-over-year changes in California’s merchandise export trade during the last quarter of 2025. In recent years, eleven commodity groups have posted three-month export totals exceeding $1 billion. In the fourth quarter, Primary Metal Manufacturing joined that group. Still, all but six recorded year-over-year declines. It is especially noteworthy that exports of Agricultural Products occupy second place in export value, trailing only shipments of Computer & Electronic Products but ahead of exports of Transportation Equipment and Chemicals.

DESTINATIONS

Fourteen foreign markets recorded one billion dollars or more in shipments from California in the last quarter. Not surprisingly, trade policy discords helped lower shipments to Mexico and Canada by 6.8% from the last quarter of 2024. China also continued its precipitous declines as both Taiwan and Japan claimed larger shares of California’s export trade than that nation. The Netherlands, Germany, and the United Kingdom also claimed places among the Top Ten destinations for California exports.
 

In the last quarter of 2025, California’s merchandise export trade with the economies of East Asia rose by 0.7 % as the value of shipments across the Pacific totaled $15.817 billion, up from $15.712 billion one year earlier. Meanwhile, California’s exports to the European Union and the United Kingdom jumped by 8.1% to $9.479 billion from $8.771 billion. The state’s exports to Latin America and the Caribbean (excluding Mexico) slipped by 0.7% to $2.430 billion from $2.446 billion. Finally, California’s shipments to the nations of Sub-Saharan Africa in the last quarter of 2025 plunged by 48.6% to $169 million. 
 
Mexico and Canada, America’s partners in the Canada-Mexico-US Free Trade Area, combined to account for 26.4% of California’s $47.961 billion merchandise export trade in the last quarter of 2025, down from 28.3% one year earlier.   

MODE OF TRANSPORT

Well over half (51.2%) of California’s merchandise export trade in last year’s final quarter was shipped by air, while waterborne transport accounted for 25.9% of the state’s outbound overseas trade. Containerized shipments accounted for 19.1% of the total value of California’s export trade. The balance of the state’s exports largely travelled overland to Canada and Mexico.  

THE OUTLOOK

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled today that President Trump exceeded his constitutional authority by using the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) to justify broad tariffs on imported merchandise. The ruling will have major economic and perhaps even larger political repercussions, both here and abroad.

What those repercussions will be is not immediately clear. Under normal circumstances, the immediate impact would be a cessation of tariffs collected under the IEEPA followed by demands for refunds from businesses that had already paid an estimated $130 billion in duties on imported goods. A stop to the collection of Customs duties would serve to sharply boost import traffic while presumably having a salutary impact on U.S. exports as other countries respond to tariff reductions here. 

Still, it remains to be seen how far the President might go in delaying the winding-down of the IEEPA tariffs as he pursues other legal justifications for his sweeping use of tariffs. Indeed, it is not obvious that President Trump will feel any more constrained by the Supreme Court’s ruling than by other constitutional guardrails he has ignored.

As for seeking legal grounds for his tariffs, the President faces a cumbersome and time-consuming process that requires formal investigations into specific allegations of unfair trade practices by other nations. Replacing the President’s preference for sweeping tariffs, often imposed for dubious reasons, is likely to strain the administration’s capacity for erecting more targeted tariffs.

An even murkier issue involves the fate of the various trade pacts America’s trading partners have signed or are negotiating with the United States. The fundamental premise of these agreements has been that President Trump has had the authority to impose tariffs under the IEEFA, tariffs that then brought our trading partners to the negotiating table. The Supreme Court’s ruling means that these negotiations have been undertaken under a false premise. We can expect great uncertainty over the trade pacts the Trump administration has signed.

Coming so soon after the U.S. House of Representatives moved to restrict President Trump’s latitude in wielding the sword of tariffs, today’s ruling should restore a firmer constitutional balance in the conduct of the nation’s international trade policies. Six Republicans joined Democrats in a vote to repeal tariffs the President imposed on Canada. Not that this move alone will have any practical impact. The Senate is unlikely to concur, and President Trump would doubtless veto any legislation to limit his powers. 

For the moment, we wait for the next move from the White House.

Probably the next most salient development is the still unscheduled but widely anticipated meeting between Chinese President Xi and President Trump. China’s importance as an export market for American goods has obviously waned since Mr. Trump first took office in 2017. Since then, economic policies adopted in Beijing have hardened as President Xi has sought to insulate China from the repercussions of a longer or deeper trade war with the United States. It is unclear which side currently has more leverage.

What is worrisome is the lack of clarity over what President Trump has to offer to President Xi that might run counter to longer term U.S. interests. The Chinese would relish the prospect of less restricted access to vital western technologies that the United States has been denying them for very legitimate national security reasons. Access to the most advanced computer chip manufacturing equipment is probably the top prize targeted by Beijing. 

That brings us around to the subject of Taiwan, the global leader in semiconductor manufacturing with an estimated 60% share of the worldwide market. The island nation lately has become California’s third most import export market, ahead of Japan, China, and South Korea. The forthcoming summit between Presidents Trump and Xi will no doubt include discussion of Taiwan’s eventual fate, especially if Beijing launches an armed takeover of the island. The substance of that discussion is apt to be of immense consequence to a great many people.