Chinese manufacturing grew slightly slower this month compared with last month, according to a survey released yesterday, in a new sign of the shaky recovery in the world’s second-biggest economy.
The preliminary version of HSBC’s purchasing managers’ index released yesterday slipped to 50.5 from 50.8 last month.
The index uses a 100-point scale on which numbers below 50 indicate a contraction.
Chinese shares extended losses yesterday and ended at a four-week low after the HSBC survey showed that growth in China’s manufacturing activity slipped this month.
The Shanghai Composite Index fell 1.6 percent to 2,160.86 points in a fifth straight daily loss, while the CSI300 of the leading Shanghai and Shenzhen A-share listings dropped 1.6 percent. Both sank to their lowest since Nov. 15.
The report indicates a resilient but slowing economy. China’s economic growth fell to a two-decade low of 7.5 percent in the three months ending in June, before rebounding by 7.8 percent in the latest quarter.
While the survey found that growth slowed marginally from last month “it still stands above the average reading for the third quarter, implying that the recovering trend of the manufacturing sector starting from July still holds up,” HSBC economist Qu Hongbin (屈宏斌) said.
Qu added that he expected China’s economic growth to stabilize at about 7.8 percent in the fourth quarter.
New orders grew at a faster rate compared with the month before, though employment fell and production growth slowed, the survey said.
The survey is based on 85 to 90 percent of responses from 420 manufacturing companies in China. The full version of the survey is to be released on Jan. 2.
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