Igor Kutyaev
China’s retail sales growth picked up, rising 2.7% year-on-year in July, compared to 2% in June, pointing to 18th consecutive month of expansion in retail trade and, compared to market forecasts of 2.6%.
On a monthly basis, the retail activity grew 0.35% in July 2024, rebounding from a downwardly revised 0.10% fall in the previous month. For the first seven months of the year, the retail turnover grew by 3.5%.
Industrial production also showed signs of weakness, with growth slowing to 5.1% in July from 5.3% the prior month, the weakest pace since March, and below market expectations of 5.2%.
On a year-to-date basis, industrial output expanded 5.9%.
In the property sector, new home prices across 70 major cities sank 4.9% from a year earlier in July 2024, marking the steepest decline since June 2015 and underscoring the deepening property crisis despite ongoing efforts by Beijing to stabilize the sector.
Separate data showed, China’s fixed-asset investment rose by 3.6% year-on-year from January to July 2024, compared with market forecasts and growth figures in the prior period of 3.9%.
Moreover, the unemployment rate inched up to 5.2% in July, after holding steady at 5% for the previous three months, and slightly above market forecasts of 5.1%.
Considering January to July, the urban surveyed jobless rate averaged 5.1%, down 0.2 percentage points compared to the same period last year.
The Shanghai Composite jumped 1.1% to above 2,880 on Thursday, with mainland stocks rebounding from six-month lows as investors digested mixed economic reports in China, offshore yuan weakened toward 7.16 per dollar, retreating from a one-week-high.
ETFs: (FXI), (KWEB), (CQQQ), (MCHI), (ASHR), (YINN), (TDF), (CHIQ), (GXC), (EWH), (KBA), (YANG), (CXSE), (CAF), (CWEB), (PGJ), (KURE).
Currency: (CNY:USD)
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