Key Points
- CBP is considering cross-checking foreign export records against U.S. import filings, potentially exposing discrepancies in value, classification and product identity while narrowing the information gaps used by some unauthorized vape shipments.
- For vapes without FDA marketing authorization, accurate customs declarations would mean more than higher duties: even fully taxed products could still be denied legal entry because they lack authorization.
- Industry sources said U.S.-bound logistics for leading unauthorized vape products is concentrated among fewer than 10 core Chinese freight forwarders, which absorb enforcement risk over time through dynamic pricing, seizure compensation and credits against future freight charges.
- M said that if existing gray-market customs channels are pushed toward costlier underground transportation, unauthorized vapes could lose their price advantage in the U.S., making parts of China’s export business commercially unviable.
- China’s U.S.-bound vape and related-product exports still rose 8.4% to $1.98 billion in the first seven months of 2026, suggesting that existing supply chains can absorb episodic enforcement shocks. Cross-checking export-side data, however, could create a more persistent structural constraint.
2Firsts | Shenzhen
September 7, 2026
A proposal that could require U.S. importers to provide documents filed with foreign customs authorities may deal a “devastating” blow to parts of China’s vape export industry, according to a veteran Chinese logistics professional with extensive experience in cross-border vape shipping.
Because of the commercial and enforcement sensitivity of the subject, 2Firsts is identifying him only as M.
M said the greatest exposure lies with unauthorized vaping products that depend on opaque, all-inclusive shipping arrangements involving undervaluation, inaccurate product descriptions or tariff classifications, or importers of record whose role is not transparent.
For those products, the problem may extend beyond paying additional duties. Foreign export records showing the actual product description and classification could make it easier for U.S. authorities to identify a shipment as containing e-cigarettes. Paying the correct duty would not resolve the separate question of whether the products have marketing authorization from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.
The proposal carries implications for China’s largest vape export market. China exported approximately $1.98 billion of vape and related products to the U.S. from January through July 2026, up 8.4% from a year earlier, according to China Customs data analyzed by 2Firsts. July shipments alone rose 53.5% to $404.2 million.
The customs data cover three tariff categories associated with vaping devices, nicotine-containing non-combustible products and other nicotine-substitute products. They record declared exports and do not distinguish between FDA-authorized and unauthorized products.
CBP Could Cross-Check Export and Import Filings
CBP published an advance notice of proposed rulemaking, or ANPRM, on September 2 as part of the implementation of President Donald Trump’s June 3 Executive Order 14411 on strengthening customs enforcement.
The agency is considering collecting documents that exporters are required to submit to foreign customs authorities before goods are shipped to the United States. Examples listed by CBP include export declarations, commercial invoices, packing lists, certificates of origin, export permits and transport documents.
Export declarations may show the value, classification and quantity reported to the exporting country. CBP said the information could help it reconcile foreign records with U.S. entry and entry-summary filings and identify discrepancies indicating violations, including dual invoicing.
The agency is still seeking comments on whether the requirement should cover all imported goods, whether records should be submitted with an entry or retained for later inspection, and how importers should explain differences in value, quantity or classification. Comments are due within 90 days of publication. No final rule or implementation date has been established.
Public data already show a large gap between records on the two sides of the trade. China reported more than 26 billion yuan, or about $3.6 billion, of vape exports to the U.S. in 2024, while U.S. customs figures recorded only $333 million of Chinese vape imports officially received that year, according to a Reuters analysis.
Two customs-data specialists told Reuters that discrepancies between trading partners were common but that a gap of about 90% was unusual. Reuters also found that one customs broker near Chicago O’Hare handled 60% of the vape and vape-parts shipments from China registered by the FDA in 2024. Six of the 10 largest U.S. recipients identified in the data were little-known companies established in 2023 or 2024, some using residential addresses.
The bilateral data gap cannot by itself be treated as evidence that the difference represents undervaluation or smuggling. Tariff classifications, valuation methods, shipping dates, transit trade and statistical coverage can all produce discrepancies. But its scale illustrates the information gap that CBP is seeking to narrow.
China’s All-Inclusive Vape Shipping Model
Chinese freight forwarders commonly market a service known domestically as shuangqing baoshui, literally “double customs clearance with duties and taxes included.”
The service combines export clearance in China, international transportation, import clearance in the destination country, duties and taxes, and final delivery into a single per-kilogram or per-shipment quote. Some providers also promise compensation based on the cost of goods if a shipment is seized.
The arrangement broadly resembles all-inclusive Delivered Duty Paid, or DDP, shipping. Legitimate DDP is a recognized Incoterms structure under which the seller handles import clearance and pays the applicable duties. DDP itself is not evidence of customs fraud.
The risk arises when an all-inclusive quote depends on declaring a lower value, using an inaccurate product description or classification, or routing imports through an opaque importer of record. M said such practices are widespread in the unauthorized vape logistics business he encounters, although no public data establish how much of China’s total U.S.-bound vape trade uses them.
M put recent all-inclusive rates for U.S.-bound vape shipments at approximately 40–50 yuan ($5.60–$7.00) per kilogram by sea and 95–98 yuan by air. The higher air-freight price reflects transportation costs as well as the greater risk perceived by service providers.
A second veteran Chinese industry professional, identified only as S, said many freight forwarders maintain their own internal “algorithms” for adjusting prices asirectory perceived seizure risks and compensation liabilities change.
The term does not refer to a standardized formula or regulated insurance model. According to S, forwarders draw on their own cargo losses, the recent performance of customs-clearance channels, peer intelligence and expected payouts. When seizures rise, projected compensation costs are incorporated into subsequent freight quotes. When the perceived risk declines, rates fall.
In that sense, the quote functions partly as a logistics price and partly as informal risk underwriting.
If CBP can compare the foreign export declaration with the U.S. import filing, M said, the pricing structure would become harder to sustain. A lower value or different description filed in the U.S. could be placed alongside the information submitted when the same cargo left China.
For unauthorized vapes, accurate documentation could create a second problem. The same records that establish the correct customs value may also reveal that the shipment contains regulated tobacco products lacking FDA marketing authorization.
O’Hare Seizures Expose the Cost of Customs Risk
Dedicated cargo charter flights carrying vaping products are an established part of the industry’s air-freight operations from China to the U.S.
M said vape cargo on several such charter flights was seized in its entirety at Chicago O’Hare around May 2026, involving more than 200 metric tons of goods. He said the figure was based on information about specific flights and cargo obtained through his industry network, rather than an extrapolation from a general seizure rate.
2Firsts could not independently confirm the flights or total cargo weight through CBP announcements, court documents or other public records.
Logistics operators described the 70%–80% seizure rate sometimes cited for O’Hare during that period as a perception based on their own losses, peer feedback and market quotes—not a statistical measure of all vape cargo passing through the airport.
However, several Shenzhen-based vape supply-chain participants separately gave 2Firsts broadly consistent accounts in June, saying the risk of air shipments being seized at O’Hare had increased sharply.
Some exporters continued using air freight because it could replenish U.S. inventories within approximately three to seven days, compared with around two weeks or longer by sea. Supply-chain sources said Foger was expanding and replenishing U.S. inventories at the time, while Geek Bar and other leading unauthorized disposable-vape products were also facing pressure to restock.
2Firsts could not determine which brands were carried on the seized flights or establish that the shortages were caused by the O’Hare seizures.
A Chinese logistics industry source identified as F said one forwarder involved in the May incident faced cargo-loss compensation liabilities worth tens of millions of yuan and potentially approaching 100 million yuan, calculated on exporters’ product costs.
Unable to make such a large payment at once, the forwarder negotiated to convert some of the compensation into credits against future freight charges, F said. Exporters would continue using the provider, while later shipping fees would be deducted from the outstanding compensation balance.
F said a major loss did not necessarily force a freight forwarder out of business. During periods of smoother customs clearance and higher shipment volumes, the companies could generate substantial profits. Over a longer cycle, they sought to balance profitable periods against seizure-heavy ones through accumulated earnings, repricing and future freight business.
Supply-chain sources said U.S.-bound logistics for leading unauthorized vape products has long been concentrated among fewer than 10 core Chinese freight forwarders. That concentration makes the providers capable of pooling risk across shipments and time—but also turns them into potential points of disruption affecting multiple exporters.
When Gray Trade Is Pushed Further Underground
M said exporters would face three broad choices if foreign export documents became a meaningful part of U.S. import enforcement: adopt accurate customs procedures and meet applicable product requirements, reduce or abandon the U.S. market, or move further into underground transportation.
The third option could be much more expensive.
S said all-inclusive logistics quotes for restricted vape shipments to Australia reached as high as approximately 1,000 yuan per kilogram in May and June 2026 as perceived seizure risks and compensation exposure increased. More recently, quotes had fallen to around 200 yuan per kilogram, broadly consistent with the level cited separately by M.
S interpreted the decline as a sign that logistics operators perceived less immediate pressure at the border, even as Australian authorities continued to release enforcement news. The quotes and interpretation are based on industry experience; 2Firsts could not independently verify the rates or corresponding changes in seizure activity.
Australia serves as a warning rather than a direct model for the United States. M said the economics of Australia’s regulated and underground markets leave more room for illicit sellers to absorb very high logistics costs. The U.S. has a different tax, retail and authorized-product structure.
If unauthorized U.S.-bound vapes were forced to absorb transport costs approaching the Australian peak, M said, their landed cost could exceed that of legally marketed products. For many Chinese exporters, the result would not simply be narrower margins. The business could become commercially unviable.
The latest trade data show that point has not yet been reached. China’s U.S.-bound exports were down 13% in the first five months of 2026 but returned to near-flat growth by the end of June. July’s 53.5% increase pushed the January–July total 8.4% above the same period in 2025.
The timing is consistent with industry accounts that some cargo shifted from air to sea after the O’Hare seizures. Logistics operators perceived the inspection rate for relevant ocean shipments at around 3% during the period of elevated air-freight seizures. Both figures were experience-based assessments, not official statistics.
China Customs data do not identify the mode of transportation, product authorization status or brands involved, however, so the July rebound cannot be attributed directly to a shift toward ocean freight.
Previous enforcement shocks mainly changed the probability of seizure on a particular route. Exporters and forwarders could respond by adjusting transportation modes, raising prices, delaying compensation or rebuilding inventories.
The CBP proposal could be more consequential because it would add foreign export values, classifications and product descriptions to the U.S. import review process. If the change turns episodic, port-specific enforcement risk into a more persistent supply-chain constraint, the impact could extend beyond freight rates.
It could challenge the information gap and risk-pooling system on which part of China’s unauthorized vape export business has been built.
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Note: Information concerning the O’Hare seizures, logistics rates, cargo-loss compensation and perceived enforcement risks is based on interviews conducted by 2Firsts with Chinese vape supply-chain and cross-border logistics professionals. Sources are identified by pseudonyms because of the commercial and enforcement sensitivity of the subject. Figures that could not be independently confirmed through public records are identified as industry estimates or source accounts in the article.
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