China's trade surplus hit US$185.65 billion in the first nine months, surpassing the full-year figure in 2006, the General Administration of Customs said Friday.

September's trade surplus reached US$23.91 billion, up 56.3 percent from the same month a year ago.

Exports in the January-September period rose 27.1 percent year on year to US$878.24 billion, while imports were up 19.1 percent to US$692.56 billion.

Last year, China's trade surplus soared 74.2 percent to a record US$177.47 billion.

Exports in the January-September period rose 27.1 percent year on year to US$878.2 billion, while imports were up 19.1 percent to US$692.6 billion.

This year's trade volume is likely to reach a record US$2 trillion, compared with US$1.76 trillion in 2006, said analysts.

With government restrictions on exports of natural resources, China's exports of crude oil in the first nine months dropped 49.3 percent to 2.44 million tons.

Meanwhile, imports of crude oil rose 13.6 percent to 1.24 trillion tons, while imports of refined oil dropped eight percent to 26.8 million tons.

The oil imports were worth a total of US$63.7 billion.