Data released this week show that China is still flying in the face the global economic slowdown. Retail sales there soared 21.6% year on year  in May, despite a devastating earthquake and stock market slump. Exports for the same month surged 28.1%, even as demand in major western markets faltered.

“The export statistics are serving as evidence of an economic theory known as ‘decoupling,’”, writes Jason Simpkins in Money Morning, “in which emerging markets in Asia and Europe have developed enough market place muscle to no longer be dependent on the U.S. economy for growth”.

And ‘decoupled’ markets can survive – and even thrive – even if the United States were to spiral down into a recession.

The report ’suggests that those saying that exports are collapsing are wrong,’ Stephen Green, head of China research at Standard Chartered Bank PLC in Shanghai, said in a report.

Trade did grow with the more mature economies of the West. But China got its biggest boost from such emerging markets as India. Two-way trade with India increased by 70% in the first five months of 2008, the fastest rate of growth among China’s Top 10 trading partners.

China is also forging stronger ties with Latin America. In 2004, Chinese President Hu Jintao predicted that Sino-Latin American trade would reach $100 billion by 2010.

In reality, it reached $102.6 billion in 2007, surging 42% from the year before.

The fact that Chinese exports have more than weathered the global financial storm is a huge blow for critics who had earlier predicted this credit-related mess would cause China to stumble.

China’s economy grew by 10.6% in the first quarter of 2008, despite complications stemming from the U.S. credit crunch, the Chinese New Year and the worst ice storm the country had seen in decades.

‘We have a lot of evidence to support the decoupling view,’ Timothy Bond, Merrill Lynch & Co. Inc.’s (MER) chief Asia economist, said in a research note.

Indeed, the recent surge in exports is proof that China will continue to advance – with all but a complete collapse of the U.S. economy. The growth in sales overseas sales, regardless of what happens in the United States, but they also proved that Chinese trade isn’t dependent on the weakness of the yuan.

For years, the United States and other Western powers have claimed that China has kept its currency, the yuan, artificially low to boost exports. But the yuan gained more than 10% on the dollar in the year through May, and still exports surged.

In the past year in fact, even with the freefalling dollar, China’s trade surplus with the United States has grown from $12.6 billion to$14.3 billion, a gain of 13%. And the fact that exports are accelerating along with the value of the yuan will give China’s central bank some latitude in dealing with inflation.

‘Robust export growth could dispel domestic concerns that a stronger yuan is hurting exports too much,’ Gene Ma, head economist at China Economic Monitor, told BBC News.

The yuan has appreciated 5% against the dollar so far this year, making Chinese goods more expensive in foreign markets. At its current rate, the yuan will almost certainly improve on the mere 7% gain it posted against the dollar last year. And that will help China control inflation and shift from what its central bank called ‘heated’ growth to a more-sustainable economic expansion.

In fact, the effects of a stronger yuan already can be seen. Consumer inflation slowed to 7.7% in May from 8.5% the month prior, two government officials said Tuesday, citing statistics bureau data.

‘Inflation has peaked, at least temporarily,’ Ben Simpfendorfer, a currency strategist at Royal Bank of Scotland in Hong Kong, told Bloomberg. ‘Pork prices have stabilized to some extent. Vegetable prices certainly have.’

Food costs account for 34% of China’s consumer price index, and growth in agricultural prices slowed to 19.3% in May from 24.2% a month earlier, according to the Ministry of Agriculture.

Furthermore, the recent surge in oil prices probably won’t affect China’s consumer prices because of generous government subsidies. The government can afford to subsidize the price of fuel and is likely to continue to do so, Mark Williams, an economist at Capital Economics Ltd., said in a recent report.

‘Even if international oil prices remained at their current levels, the total net subsidy bill for the year would probably amount to less than half of one percent of GDP,’ Williams wrote in a June 5 report. ‘The costs of keeping prices down are still manageable given the strength of China’s state sector. Officials are wary of anything that could raise inflation expectations.’

And even though as producer prices climbed an astonishing 8.2% in May, inflation could still recede in the second half of the year – in part because figures will be compared with prices from last year when food prices soared uncontrollably.

‘The worst is behind us now,’ Paul Tang, an economist with the Bank of East Asia Ltd. (OTC ADR: BKEAY) in Hong Kong, told Bloomberg. ‘The question is more about at what pace the improvement is going to be realized in coming months.’

Profit watch’s Manraaj Singh sees huge potential for investment in China’s stock markets:

China’s CSI 300 Index, which tracks the leading companies on both of China’s stock markets, has fallen by 32 per from its October peak. That’s the biggest decline among the world’s 20 biggest equity markets. Hard luck if you were already invested in it, but excellent news if you’re looking to get in.

The slump has narrowed the CSI 200’s price-earnings gap with the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index to just 13 per cent at the end of last week. It was 139 per cent at its October peak. Companies in the CSI 300 now trade at an average price-earnings ratio of 26.4, down from a record of 52.8 in October. So, right now, they’re just slightly above the 23.4 ratio for the S&P 500. And China’s higher growth rates justify that.

But take a look at the Hang Seng China Enterprises Index. It measures the performance of 42 major Chinese companies that trade in Hong Kong. It has been cheaper than the S&P 500 since March and is now valued at 18.1 times profit. That puts it on a 12 per cent discount to the U.S. markets.

That brings me back to a point that I have been making here in this newsletter – The Asian markets have been massively oversold. A correction was in order, but the current sell-off has gone beyond what can be justified by the fundamentals.

The CSI 300 surged by 478 per cent over the last two years as China’s economy continued to race ahead and the government increased the supply of state-owned shares. But valuations clearly got well ahead of themselves. The rally fizzled this year on fears that prices had outstripped earnings prospects, that new share sales would overwhelm demand and that the highest interest rates in nine years will slow profit growth.

But those fears have been overblown. Chinese companies’ earnings actually grew by 5.5 per cent in the first three months of this year. Things haven’t gone so well in America. U.S. companies profits have dropped by 16 percent in the first quarter. China is clearly the better bet right now. Even after this years’ declines, the CSI 300 is still 322% higher than it was three years ago.

So, the correction in China provides a good opportunity to get in. A lot of the best companies are now trading on very attractive valuations. Even if we make allowance for overly optimistic growth forecasts for some of them, they still offer much better value than you are getting in the West right now.

How do we best play this? I like the country’s transport sector. The Chinese economy is still booming; and so is most of Asia…

I am tremendously bullish on Asian shipping companies at the moment. Right now, I see fantastic value in this sector, and nowhere better than in China.