China's May trade surplus with U.S. rises to $26.89 billion

FILE PHOTO: A U.S. dollar banknote featuring American founding father Benjamin Franklin and a China's yuan banknote featuring late Chinese chairman Mao Zedong among U.S. and Chinese flags in this illustration picture taken May 20, 2019. REUTERS/Jason Lee/Illustration/File Photo

BEIJING (Reuters) - China's trade surplus with the United States rose to $26.89 billion in May, from $21.01 billion in April, customs data showed on Monday.

For January-May combined, China's trade surplus with the U.S. stood at $110.55 billion.

China's large trade surplus with the United States has long been a sore point with Washington, and is at the centre of a bitter dispute between the two countries.

Trade tensions between Washington and Beijing escalated sharply last month with U.S. President Donald Trump on May 10 slapping higher tariffs of up to 25% on $200 billion of Chinese goods. Beijing retaliated with tariff hikes on U.S. goods.

Washington is also threatening to levy higher tariffs on the remaining $300 billion Chinese goods.

(Reporting by Beijing Monitoring Desk; Editing by Shri Navaratnam)