紐時賞析／關稅漲 詐欺與會計花招橫行

川普政府提高中國商品進口關稅，激發廠商各種避稅手法，包括保齡球業者。紐約時報

As Tariffs Climb, Trade Fraud and Accounting Tricks Proliferate

關稅漲 詐欺與會計花招橫行

As President Donald Trump’s stiff tariffs on China went into effect, a curious thing happened to the metal containers carrying Chinese goods to the United States.

當川普對中國的嚴厲關稅正式生效時，一件奇怪的事發生在運載中國貨物前往美國的金屬貨櫃上。

The average value of the products in a 20-foot container plunged nearly 40% from January 2025 to February 2026, according to data compiled by ImportGenius, a trade data provider. Yet the average value of a container headed to the United States from elsewhere in the world remained relatively flat.

根據業者ImportGenius彙整的數據，20呎貨櫃內產品的平均價值，從2025年1月到2026年2月暴跌了近40%。然而，從世界其他地區運往美國的貨櫃平均價值，則維持相對平穩。

The reason? Experts say companies most likely began finding ways to reduce the value of the goods they were sending to the United States. Lowering the value of the toys, couches and other products headed for America’s shores meant that companies could also reduce the amount of tariffs they had to pay for those imports.

原因爲何？專家表示，企業很可能開始想方設法降低輸往美國貨物的申報價值。降低玩具、沙發和其他銷往美國產品的價值，也意味着企業可以減少必須支付的關稅金額。

Some firms turned to new suppliers outside China to lower their tariff bill, setting up factories in Vietnam, Mexico and other nations that faced lower U.S. tariffs. Others have found ways to substantially reduce the recorded value of their Chinese shipments without finding new factories, using tactics ranging from legal accounting tricks to outright fraud.

有些公司轉向中國以外的新供應商，以降低關稅負擔，在越南、墨西哥和其他面對較低美國關稅的國家設立工廠。其他公司則在不更換工廠的情況下，找到大幅降低中國出貨記錄價值的方法，所使用的手段從鑽法律漏洞的會計操作到公然的詐欺都有。

Some firms have routed their products through middlemen to take advantage of obscure regulations that can lower a product’s value. In other cases, firms hire Chinese shippers that illegally reduce the value of the import. Because tariffs are charged as a percentage of that value, that, in turn, cuts how much is owed.

有些公司透過中間商轉運產品，利用模糊的法規來降低產品價值。在其他案例中，企業僱用中國貨運業者，非法降低進口貨物的價值。由於關稅是按該價值的百分比收取，這也隨之減少了應繳金額。

Ryan Petersen, CEO of Flexport, a supply chain management company, said that kind of fraud was hard to detect, because the price of goods could be subjective. But it is an easy way to lower a tariff bill.

供應鏈管理公司飛協博執行長彼得森表示，這類詐欺很難偵測，因爲貨物價格具有主觀性。但這是降低關稅帳單的簡便方式。

Altering the valuation of Chinese goods means that U.S. statistics may exaggerate a recent trend in which trade with China appeared to be declining. On paper, the U.S. trade deficit with China and imported Chinese goods both plummeted by nearly one-third last year.

改變中國貨物的估值，意味着美國統計數據可能誇大了近期中國貿易看似衰退的趨勢。帳面上，美國對中國的貿易赤字以及從中國進口的貨物，去年都驟減近3分之1。

Changes in valuation may also explain some of the large and growing gap between trade data published by the U.S. and Chinese governments. Last year, China reported exporting nearly $112 billion more to the United States than what Washington said it had received, suggesting that trading firms are misrepresenting their activity to at least one government. That gap was $26 billion wider in 2025 than in 2024.

估值改變也可能解釋了美國與中國政府公佈的貿易數據之間，出現巨大且不斷擴大的差距。去年，中國報告對美國出口的金額，比華盛頓所稱收到的金額多了近1120億美元，這顯示貿易公司至少對其中一方政府隱瞞了實際活動。這個差距在2025年比2024年擴大了260億美元。

文／Ana Swanson，譯／國際中心

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