The figure marked the first drop in shipments since February and missed a Bloomberg forecast of a 2.9% rise.

Imports in the same month rose 1% percent, China’s General Administration of Customs said. That was short of the 2.7% estimated in the Bloomberg forecast.

China and the US reached a detente in their trade war last week after Xi and Trump met in South Korea.

That brought a precarious end to months of tit-for-tat measures between the economic and technological powerhouses as the leaders agreed to suspend a raft of measures for one year.

Washington halved a blanket tariff on Chinese goods to 10%, while Beijing loosened restrictions on exports of rare earth technologies — a sector it dominates.

China also lifted extra tariffs on US agricultural products including soybeans, critical to American farmers who are a key part of Trump’s base.

China’s imports from the US fell 11.6% month-on-month in October, the customs data showed, while its exports in the other direction rose 1.8%.

Chinese exporters had been “frontloading their trade in order to avoid high tariffs in the US”, Zhiwei Zhang, economist at Pinpoint Asset Management, said in a note.

“It seems the frontloading finally faded in October. As the trade war is put on hold for one year, exports will likely normalise,” Zhang added.

But, he warned: “Now that export momentum weakens, China needs to rely more on domestic demand.”