Chinese economic growth slows to 7.6%

Chinese economic growth slows to 7.6%

By Simon Rabinovitch in Beijing
July 13, 2012

Over the past two months, as evidence of the slowdown has mounted, the government has shifted its policy to a pro-growth stance, which analysts say is likely to bring about a recovery in the second half of the year.

“The expectation for weakness in the second quarter was pretty strong. But the investment number is the surprise. There appears to have been a significant pick-up. That is policy beginning to work”, said Ken Peng, an economist with BNP Paribas in Beijing. “We are looking for a small rebound in the third quarter and a bigger rebound in the fourth quarter.”

The year-to-date investment figure jumped from 20.1 per cent in May to 20.4 per cent last month, an indication that the increase in investment in June alone must have been considerably stronger, following on the heels of the government’s moves to stimulate the economy.
The Chinese central bank cut interest rates last week, the second time in less than a month. Premier Wen Jiabao has also said that the government will look to increase public investment to stabilise the economy.
A steep drop in inflation – from last year’s high near 7 per cent to just over 2 per cent – has cleared the way for more aggressive policy easing.
The latest bank lending figures, published on Thursday, confirmed that the government is clearly trying to support growth. New loans reached Rmb920bn ($114bn) in June, up from Rmb793bn in May and more than expected.
Yet officials have also repeatedly vowed that they will not unleash a massive stimulus programme as they did in late 2008 when the global financial crisis erupted. That boom in spending and bank lending fuelled debt worries that China is still trying to contain as well as a property bubble that it has been trying to deflate.
Mr Wen has also been adamant that the government will not relax the measures that it has used to dampen property speculation, fearful that a big rebound in already lofty housing prices could ensue.
If the second quarter does indeed prove to be the trough of this economic cycle for China, commentators who have described the current downturn as a soft landing would have some vindication.
The peak-to-trough drop in growth would be 4.5 percentage points from 2010 to now. That contrasts with a plunge of 8 percentage points in the previous downturn, from 2007 to the start of 2009.
The Shanghai Composite, China’s main stock market, initially rose after the release, but was soon trading flat, while in Hong Kong, the Hang Seng index was slightly higher.