China's economy may have leveled out of its worst slump since the global financial crisis, as its performance in September beat market expectations and showed signs of stabilization, the National Bureau of Statistics said yesterday.

 

Although the growth slowed further in the third quarter, some economists said an economic rebound has been taking shape gradually in the world's second-largest economy.

 

Gross domestic product expanded 7.4 percent from a year earlier in the July-September period, the slowest since the first quarter of 2009. It was lower than the increase of 7.6 percent in the second quarter, but the 0.2 percentage point decline was much gentler than in earlier quarters.

 

The overall economic output grew to 35.3 trillion yuan (US$5.6 trillion) for the year to date, up 7.7 percent year on year.

 

Sheng Laiyun, a bureau spokesman, said China has presented a generally stable economic performance so far this year, and the country will better implement supportive policies already announced to stabilize growth and accelerate economic restructuring.

 

"The central government has placed economic growth in a more prominent position on the work agenda in a timely way, and rolled out positive policies to sustain the development," Sheng said. "Some policy effects have been seen, and I expect more policy impacts on the way to cement an economic recovery in the fourth quarter."

 

China's industrial production gained 10 percent on an annual basis in the first three quarters, down 0.5 percentage points from that in the first half, the bureau's data showed.

 

Fixed-asset investment rose 20.5 percent year on year in the first nine months, which is 0.1 percentage point quicker than the average monthly pace in the first six months, thanks to more large-scale projects getting approved in recent months.

 

Retail sales expanded 14.1 percent in the first three quarters, while overall trade growth also slowed to 6.2 percent.

 

Zhou Hao, an economist at Australia & New Zealand Banking Group Ltd, said although the third quarter's headline figures appear worrisome, a few positive signs have emerged indicating the Chinese economy is stabilizing. 

 

Zhou noted that the export value reached a record high in September, manufacturing activities improved for the first time since May, money supply and total social financing looked encouraging and onshore commodity inventories declined sharply.

 

"China has approved as much as 7 trillion yuan for infrastructure investments since May, which invites us to believe the implementation of these investment projects will accelerate in the near future," Zhou said.

 

Zhou projected a modest upturn trend for growth in China's economy in the following quarters, and Zhou's bank maintained its forecast that China's economy will grow 7.8 percent this year, with the fourth-quarter growth likely up to 7.9 percent or even 8 percent.

 

Yao Wei, an economist at Societe Generale, said China's cyclical recovery has been set in motion. The September data "support our call for a cyclical recovery in the current quarter, with growth bouncing back to around 7.7 percent," Yao said. 

 

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