China’s top statistician yesterday said anyone caught falsifying economic data would face zero tolerance and be punished under the law.
There has long been skepticism about the reliability of Chinese data, especially as the government has sought to reduce expectations of a protracted slowdown in the world’s second-largest economy.
In January, the “rustbelt” northeastern province of Liaoning said in its annual work report it had falsified reporting of fiscal data from 2011 to 2014.
Speaking on the sidelines of the annual meeting of the Chinese parliament, Chinese National Bureau of Statistics Director Ning Jizhe (寧吉喆) said violations would be investigated and punished.
“As soon as there are statistical cases that break the law or faked, it will be voted down, there will be zero tolerance, no appeasement,” said Ning, who is also Vice Chairman of the National Development and Reform Commission.
The combined economic output of China’s provinces has long exceeded national output measured by the statistics bureau, raising suspicions that local officials were overstating performance.
The gap has been narrowing, but the discrepancy between provincial GDP and the national figure was still 2.76 trillion yuan (US$399.71 billion) last year, roughly equal to Thailand’s GDP.
Ning said China’s economy has shown signs of improvement in the first two months of the year with little risk of a hard landing.
He said China’s economy stabilized in the beginning of the year, with industrial output in January and last month growing more than 6 percent, and the services sector expanding more than 8 percent.
The country’s campaign to cut overcapacity also appears to be bearing fruit.
The coal and steel industries reported negative growth and property inventories in China’s third and fourth-tier cities declined in the first two months, he said.
Ning’s remarks suggested that policymakers in Beijing are more upbeat as they set a growth target of about 6.5 percent for this year.
On Tuesday, US President Donald Trump weighed in on a pressing national issue: The rebranding of a restaurant chain. Last week, Cracker Barrel, a Tennessee company whose nationwide locations lean heavily on a cozy, old-timey aesthetic — “rocking chairs on the porch, a warm fire in the hearth, peg games on the table” — announced it was updating its logo. Uncle Herschel, the man who once appeared next to the letters with a barrel, was gone. It sparked ire on the right, with Donald Trump Jr leading a charge against the rebranding: “WTF is wrong with Cracker Barrel?!” Later, Trump Sr weighed
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) secured a record 70.2 percent share of the global foundry business in the second quarter, up from 67.6 percent the previous quarter, and continued widening its lead over second-placed Samsung Electronics Co, TrendForce Corp (集邦科技) said on Monday. TSMC posted US$30.24 billion in sales in the April-to-June period, up 18.5 percent from the previous quarter, driven by major smartphone customers entering their ramp-up cycle and robust demand for artificial intelligence chips, laptops and PCs, which boosted wafer shipments and average selling prices, TrendForce said in a report. Samsung’s sales also grew in the second quarter, up
HEADWINDS: Upfront investment is unavoidable in the merger, but cost savings would materialize over time, TS Financial Holding Co president Welch Lin said TS Financial Holding Co (台新新光金控) said it would take about two years before the benefits of its merger with Shin Kong Financial Holding Co (新光金控) become evident, as the group prioritizes the consolidation of its major subsidiaries. “The group’s priority is to complete the consolidation of different subsidiaries,” Welch Lin (林維俊), president of the nation’s fourth-largest financial conglomerate by assets, told reporters during its first earnings briefing since the merger took effect on July 24. The asset management units are scheduled to merge in November, followed by life insurance in January next year and securities operations in April, Lin said. Banking integration,
LOOPHOLES: The move is to end a break that was aiding foreign producers without any similar benefit for US manufacturers, the US Department of Commerce said US President Donald Trump’s administration would make it harder for Samsung Electronics Co and SK Hynix Inc to ship critical equipment to their chipmaking operations in China, dealing a potential blow to the companies’ production in the world’s largest semiconductor market. The US Department of Commerce in a notice published on Friday said that it was revoking waivers for Samsung and SK Hynix to use US technologies in their Chinese operations. The companies had been operating in China under regulations that allow them to import chipmaking equipment without applying for a new license each time. The move would revise what is known
RSS