Issue No.10, 2017 (Total 96)

2017-12-30

In November 2017, China’s economy maintained a steady performance across the board and the declining margin of main indicators became eased. The industrial added value increased by 6.1% year on year, declining slightly by 0.1 percentage point compared with October. The growth rate of industrial electricity consumption picked up by 0.6 percentage points. The growth of investment gradually became steady and the investment in manufacturing industry improved by a small margin. In addition, the growth rate of export improved prominently and that of consumption improved slightly. Domestic enterprises’ profits continued to improve and prices maintained stable. The real estate sales turned stable and inventory buildups declined prominently. The growth rate of M2 rebounded slightly and that of credit and social financing stock continued to stand at a relatively high level. The RMB exchange rate remained stable and the foreign exchange reserves improved for 10 consecutive months. Overall, China’s economy has maintained a steady and sound growth momentum and is projected to increase by around 6.8% in the whole year. But it should be noted that the growth rate of private investment declined and the debt of local SOEs and the leveraging rate of residential sectors improved quickly. The potential economic and financial risks are not to be underestimated and the real economy still faces some difficulties. Meanwhile, some provinces and cities are under heavy economic downward pressure plus many uncertain external factors. Efforts need to be made to fully implement the principles put forward at the 19th CPC National Congress and President Xi Jinping Thought on Socialist Economy with Chinese Characteristics in the New Era, put into effect the arrangements made at the Central Economic Work Conference and follow the underlying principle of pursuing progress while ensuring stability. We need to implement a proactive fiscal policy to enhance efficiency with joint efforts, strengthen the management of local governments’ debt and actively respond to international tax-reduction drive. We need to keep a neutral and sound monetary policy, continue our work on deleveraging and coordinate the balance between deleveraging, strengthening regulation and maintaining appropriate liquidity. We need to focus on the supply-side structural reform, make steady progress on preventing and defusing major risks, alleviating poverty in a targeted manner and fighting pollution and guide and stabilize market expectations to ensure a steady and high-quality economic performance.