One of China’s most notorious online shopping platforms Temu has been ranked as the most downloaded free app in the U.S. App Stores for second consecutive years, showcasing the dominance of the Chinese online marketplace in the world’s largest economy despite increasing restrictions for Chinese imports.
Along with Temu, TikTok came in third place despite coming under scrutiny by the U.S. authority and a threat of being shut down, and Temu’s fast-fashion rival Shein came in 12th place.
According to data from StatCounter, Apple’s iPhone has 56% of the U.S. mobile phone market share.
Temu has been operating in the U.S. market since 2022, bringing cheap Chinese goods directly from the manufacturer into America’s online market.
Temu has been under scrutiny by U.S. officials, while also being threatened by Donald Trump’s tariff policies when he began his second term as the U.S. president.
In September, the White House proposed a plan to close a loophole from “de minimis” provision to prevent abuse from companies like Temu and Shein. The provision provides an exemption to certain import duties for shipments valued under $800.
If cut off from the provision, Chinese companies like Temu and Shien would need to raise their prices to make up for duties, and lose their competitiveness in the U.S. market, said the experts.
Donald Trump also plans to impose a 60-100% tariff on all Chinese imports, while the feasibility of such a tax is debatable, the risk alone causes a considerable amount of uncertainty.
Meanwhile, in South East Asia, another major destination for Chinese export, Vietnam and Indonesia launched a series of anti-dumping tariffs on Chinese goods, and Thailand announced a measure to monitor cheap imports. As recently as early December, Vietnam has outright banned Temu after only two months of its operation in the country.
In a global outlook report released on Friday, Nomura’s U.S. economics team expected the Trump administration to put change in de minimis rule as one of its trade priorities, or even a second priority to tariffs.
Nomura predicted that the U.S. ban on de minimis import could reduce China’s annual export growth by 1.3% and push its GDP down by 0.2%.
