The US trade deficit edged off record levels in September, but a huge gap with China spelled continued tensions between the two superpowers, on the eve of the G20 summit.
The US Commerce Department reported exports nudged up and foreign imports nudged down, narrowly reducing a deficit which has become a major source of the world's escalating trade rows.
Leaders from the world's 20 leading economies will meet in South Korea from today, where trade-linked currency squabbles are set to dominate.
With much of the developed world - including the United States - still mired in slow growth and high unemployment, allegations are flying that fast-growing economies like China are pursuing unfair trade policies.
The US trade deficit edged down to $US44 billion in September, aided in part by a weaker dollar, but remained large and the gap with China still makes up more than half of the total.
The reported $2.5 billion fall from August was far greater than that expected by most economists.
Although the trade shortfall with China fell $2.2 billion in the month, it still stood at a whopping $27.8 billion, near record highs.
The United States has long blamed China's currency policy for that gap, accusing Beijing of keeping the yuan undervalued to gain an unfair advantage for its exports.
Washington is pressing G20 members to adopt a pact to curtail imbalances between trade surplus and deficit nations, with China firmly in its sights.
Beijing has hit back, with President Hu Jintao calling on other countries to "face their own problems" rather than seeking to cast blame on other nations.
China has also joined widespread and stinging criticism of the Federal Reserve's move last week to pump an extra $600 billion into the fragile US economy, a move which has caused the dollar to plummet and turned allegations of currency manipulation on the US.
According to Nigel Gault of IHS Global Insight, the weakening dollar would continue to help the US increase exports beyond the levels seen in the September data.
"We do expect export growth to accelerate now, helped by the combination of still-robust emerging-market growth with the weaker dollar," he said.
Yet despite the likely tensions that would cause, for the United States the outlook was much improved from last month and the latest figures raised hopes for faster US growth in the third and fourth quarters than once thought.
The value of trade deficits subtracts directly from gross domestic product as cash leaves the country.
"This is worth about 0.2 per cent in terms of revision to the headline (third quarter) GDP number," said Ian Shepherdson of High Frequency Economics.
The August trade deficit had been the second biggest since October 2008, when the global financial crisis accelerated, and confirmed a trend of widening gaps that began in mid-June 2009.
But some analysts cautioned that a rosier picture for US exports could be misleading.
"The rise in exports appeared to be rather limited and mostly attributable to a very volatile civilian aircraft," said Inna Mufteeva a US economist with Natixis.
Joel Naroff of Naroff Economic Advisors cautioned that the improving economic situation in the United States would spell an increase in exports.
"It was nice to see the trade deficit narrow but it is doubtful that trend will continue as imports almost certainly will grow, not shrink, going forward."
Separate data released on Wednesday also showed signs that import prices were edging up, adding to concerns about long-term inflation. According to analysts at Barclays Capital, the almost one per cent rise in import prices in October reflected a weakening dollar and rising prices for cotton, sugar, coffee and a variety of other imports.
"We expect further increases in core import prices in the coming months, reflecting the effects of a weaker dollar and higher commodity prices," said Barclay's Peter Newland.
"While pass-through to consumer prices is unlikely to be significant in the near term, this supports our view that disinflationary pressures are easing."
