Igor Kutyaev
China’s industrial production and retail sales rose less than expected in March.
China’s industrial production grew 4.5% year-on-year in March 2024, lower than the 7% growth in January-February combined and below market forecasts of 5.4%, marking the weakest industrial production expansion since then. last September, due to more moderate increases in all economic activities.
On a monthly basis, industrial production fell by 0.08%. In the first quarter of the year, industrial production grew by 6.1%.
Retail sales in China rose 3.1% year-on-year in March 2024, falling short of market forecasts of 4.5% and slowing markedly from the previous period’s 5.5% increase to 14 th consecutive month of retail trade gains but weakest gain since July 2023.
During the first three months of the year, fixed investment grew 4.5%, the most in about 3 years and higher than the consensus of 4.3% and compared to the previous month’s 4.2% increase.
China’s industrial capacity utilization rate fell to 73.6% in the first quarter of 2024 from 74.3% in the same period last year. This was the lowest industrial capacity utilization rate since the first quarter of 2020.
Separate data showed China’s surveyed unemployment rate fell to 5.2% in March 2024, down from 5.3% the previous month, in line with market expectations. Considering the January-March period, the recorded urban unemployment rate averaged 5.2%, down 0.3 percentage points compared to the same period last year.
ETFs: (FXI), (KWEB), (CQQQ), (MCHI), (ASHR), (YINN), (TDF), (CHIQ), (GXC), (EWH), (KBA), (YANG), (CXSE), (CAF), (CWEB), (PGJ), (KURE), (CHIX).
Currency: (CNY:USD)