China’s top economic planner said yesterday that it was optimistic over the outlook for the nation’s economy in the second half, but was paying close attention to volatility in the country’s stock markets.
Improved performance in the first half of the year boded well for the economy, but and growth momentum was still “insufficient,” Chinese National Development and Reform Commission secretary general Li Pumin (李樸民) told a news conference.
“Some firms still face operational difficulties, while there is relatively big pressure on fiscal revenues [growth] and the job market,” Li said.
“There is also an outstanding issue that the flow of capital does not translate into the real economy smoothly,” he said.
Beijing is facing an uphill battle to channel money into the real economy, but banks are reluctant to lend as the slowing economy fuels a rise in bad loans and they tend to charge higher lending rates as credit risks grow.
For the first six months, China reported a growth rate of 7 percent, in line with Beijing’s full-year target. However, a stock market plunge since June has fueled concerns about the health of the economy and risks to the financial system.
Li said policymakers were paying close attention to fluctuations in China’s stock markets and described the recent activity as “abnormal.”
“The fundamentals of China’s economy are stabilizing and turning better. So we have the foundation and necessary means to keep the healthy development of [the] capital market, including the stock market,” Li said.
Since early last month, China’s main indexes have tumbled by a third, before rebounding by a quarter after Beijing stepped in with a flurry of unprecedented support measures to stave off a full-blown crash.
Stocks dropped 8.48 percent on Monday, their biggest one-day fall since 2007, and gyrated wildly again yesterday, despite a fresh pledge by regulators to lend further support to the market.
The benchmark Shanghai Composite Index closed down 1.68 percent to 3,663 yesterday after falling as much as 5 percent and rising up to 0.93 percent during the day.
The Shenzhen Composite Index, which tracks stocks on China’s second exchange, ended down 2.24 percent on 2,111.7.
Asked about the outlook for inflation, Li said he expected consumer prices to edge up mildly in the second half thanks to the stabilizing of pork prices.
Speaking at the same briefing, commission Department of Integration vice-director Gao Gao (高杲) said that he was not optimistic on the outlook for external demand.
Gao reiterated that China will keep policy stable in the second half and accelerate construction of key development and infrastructure projects to lift the economy.
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”
Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day
Thousands of parents in Singapore are furious after a Cordlife Group Ltd (康盛人生集團), a major operator of cord blood banks in Asia, irreparably damaged their children’s samples through improper handling, with some now pursuing legal action. The ongoing case, one of the worst to hit the largely untested industry, has renewed concerns over companies marketing themselves to anxious parents with mostly unproven assurances. This has implications across the region, given Cordlife’s operations in Hong Kong, Macau, Indonesia, the Philippines and India. The parents paid for years to have their infants’ cord blood stored, with the understanding that the stem cells they contained