Finance

Venture capital firms in China invested $26.7 billion in 3,072 deals in the first half of 2023, PitchBook said.
On an annualized basis, that indicates a 31.4% drop from 2022 levels, — on pace to fall below that of 2016, the report said.
On the fundraising front, PitchBook said only three funds denominated in U.S. dollars closed in the first half of the year.

Chinese ride-hailing giant Didi delisted from the New York Stock Exchange just months after its June 2021 IPO after a now-resolved regulatory probe that had forced Didi to suspend new user registrations.
Brendan McDermid | Reuters

BEIJING — Slowing growth and geopolitical tensions are stifling the Chinese startup world that once spawned unicorns such as ByteDance and Didi, according to a PitchBook report Monday.
China’s economic rebound from the pandemic has slowed. U.S.-China tensions have spilled over to finance, dampening already subdued market sentiment. Chinese regulation in the last two years has also made it harder for companies to go public overseas.

Venture capital firms in China invested $26.7 billion in 3,072 deals in the first half of 2023, PitchBook said.
On an annualized basis, that indicates a 31.4% drop from 2022 levels — on pace to fall below that of 2016, the report said.
Most investments were also small.
The annualized value of mega-deals — $100 million or larger — were on pace for their lowest level since 2015, PitchBook said.

While China’s economy showed signs of picking up in the last several weeks, the slowdown in early-stage investing is a steep one to recover from.

Second-quarter deals marked the fourth-consecutive quarter of declines in deal value, according to PitchBook.
A drop in foreign participation was a factor.
The niche but once-burgeoning world of early-stage investors in China had seen firms raise billions of dollars from overseas institutions to invest in domestic startups, which would then hold an initial public offering in the U.S.

Anecdotally, we’ve heard that some US investors have pulled back from allocating to China mainly due to geopolitical concerns and several other factors…

A record low of 10% of deals included an investor based outside of Greater China, down from about 16% in 2018, PitchBook said. On the fundraising front, the report said only three funds denominated in U.S. dollars closed in the first half of the year.
“Anecdotally, we’ve heard that some US investors have pulled back from allocating to China mainly due to geopolitical concerns and several other factors, including a Chinese economic slowdown and crackdowns on the tech sector,” the report said.

Read more about China from CNBC Pro

Growth of yuan-denominated funds and mid-sized funds helped boost overall Greater China fundraising activity to $28 billion — on pace to exceed 2022 levels, but still a sharp slowdown from $131.4 billion raised in 2018, PitchBook said.
Difficulties at the end of the venture capital investing process persisted as market sentiment for IPOs in Hong Kong and the U.S. remained subdued.
The number of exits in the first half of the year fell to 130 from 177 in the second half of 2022, while exit value fell to $77.5 billion from $100.2 billion, PitchBook said. More

If central bankers are to defeat inflation, they must cool the labour market. For two years rich-world wage growth has added to corporate costs, sending prices relentlessly upwards. But as they began raising interest rates to slow the economy, policymakers hoped for an even rosier outcome. They wanted to achieve a “soft landing”, which involves both bringing down inflation, and doing so without mass job losses. It is a lot to ask of a tool as blunt as monetary policy.Are they succeeding? The question is almost certainly one that officials at the Federal Reserve will be asking when they meet on September 19th and 20th. And so far the evidence suggests that—against widespread expectations—labour markets from San Francisco to Sydney are co-operating.image: The EconomistCentral bankers started to raise rates at a time when demand for labour had almost never been so strong (see chart 1). Last year the unemployment rate across the oecd club of mostly rich countries, measuring the share of people in the labour force who would like a job, was a shade under 5%, close to an all-time low. Excess demand for labour showed up in a surge in unfilled vacancies, which reached an all-time high. Workers bargained for higher wages, knowing that they had plenty of options.The scale of the task central bankers set themselves was illustrated by history. Research by Alex Domash and Larry Summers, both of Harvard University, found that there had never been an instance in which the American vacancy rate had fallen substantially without unemployment rising significantly. Last year Michael Feroli of JPMorgan Chase, a bank, studied the record and noted that “whenever the vacancy rate goes down a little it goes down a lot, and the economy lands in recession.”To assess progress in rich-world labour markets, we have assembled data from the oecd and Indeed, a listings website, covering 16 countries. In this group, employers have reduced open vacancies by more than 20% on average from their peak—a historically rapid decline. Some countries, such as France, have seen relatively modest falls of 10% or so. In others, such as Canada, Japan and Switzerland, unfilled job postings are down by a quarter or more.image: The EconomistDeclining vacancies are helping trim wage growth. In America the annual rate of pay rises has slipped from 6% in late 2022 to below 5% today (see chart 2). Canadian wage growth is also falling fast. The story is less clear elsewhere, not least because the quality of the earnings data is worse. In Germany and Italy wage growth has probably stopped rising, though there remain pockets of concern, including in Britain—which might explain why the Bank of England, which also meets this week, is expected to raise rates again.For policymakers, this success would feel a little soiled if it came with a sharp rise in joblessness. According to rules of thumb for America discussed by Messrs Domash and Summers, in normal times you would expect a 20%-plus fall in vacancies to come alongside a rise in unemployment of three or so percentage points within a year.In reality, a year or so after vacancies started heading down, something else appears to be happening. Recently the unemployment rate in the oecd has held steady. Job growth, at 500,000 a month across the rich world, is about as fast as it was in the second half of last year. The working-age employment rate—the share of people aged 16-64 who are actually in a job—has risen to an all-time high in around half of oecd countries. Even places known for high unemployment, such as Italy and Portugal, have found jobs for an unprecedented share of their working-age population.Why are labour markets breaking the historical rule? One possibility relates to “the great resignation” during covid-19. In 2021, spooked by stories of employees quitting to start crypto firms and write novels, some employers may have put up job vacancies as an insurance policy. Now, as fewer folk quit their jobs, they are taking them down again.A second possibility relates to “labour hoarding”. During lockdowns in 2020 many companies let workers go, only to struggle to rehire them when the economy opened up. Bosses do not want to make the same mistake twice. So today, even as the economy slows and firms cut job adverts, they are trying to hang on to existing workers. Central bankers still have a task on their hands, as inflation in many places remains uncomfortably elevated. Even in America and Canada, demand for labour is high relative to supply. Across the rich world wage growth exceeds productivity growth, adding to the pressure. And Messrs Domash and Summers could still be proved right if unemployment jumps in the coming months. But after two years of bad inflation data, and warning after warning that their strategy was sure to fail, policymakers nevertheless have reason to be hopeful. ■ More

GM workers with the UAW Local 2250 union strike outside the General Motors Wentzville Assembly Plant in Wentzville, Missouri, Sept. 15, 2023.
Michael B. Thomas | Getty Images

Check out the companies making headlines in midday trading.
General Motors, Ford, Stellantis — Shares of Ford was near flat, while General Motors gained 0.9% and Stellantis was up 2.2% as a targeted strike by the United Auto Workers began. Workers walked off the job at several assembly plants belonging to the three automakers Thursday night after a key deadline to settle a new labor contract passed.

Planet Fitness — Shares slid 15.9% after the gym chain’s board pushed out CEO Chris Rondeau. The move was shocking to employees close to Rondeau, a person familiar with the matter told CNBC. Board member Craig Benson, known for his role as the former governor of New Hampshire, is the interim CEO.
Nucor — The steelmaker fell 6.1% after offering worse-than-expected guidance for third-quarter earnings, with the company pointing to pricing and volume challenges. Nucor said to expect earnings between $4.10 and $4.20 per share, while analysts polled by LSEG, formerly known as Refinitiv, forecast $4.57.
PTC Therapeutics — The therapeutics stock plummeted 29.8% after the European Medicines Agency’s Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use issued a negative opinion on a conversion of conditional to full marketing authorization for a PTC drug to treat nonsense mutation Duchenne muscular dystrophy. Raymond James downgraded the stock to underperform from outperform following the news.
Core & Main — The infrastructure stock retreated 4.1% a day after it announced a secondary stock offering. The offering of 18 million Class A shares by selling shareholders will be held concurrently with the repurchase of 3.1 million Class A shares. Partnership interests in a company unit also will be bought back.
Arm Holdings — Shares slipped 4.5% during its second session as a public company. Investment banking firm Needham initiated coverage of the stock at hold without a price target following Arm’s debut that valued the company at about $60 billion. Needham analyst Charles Shi cautioned, however, that the stock’s value already “looks full.”

Insulet, Dexcom — Shares of the diabetes-focused health-care companies fell Friday after Bloomberg News reported Thursday afternoon that Apple has selected a new leader for its team working to develop a noninvasive blood sugar monitoring device. Shares of Insulet shed 2.9%, while Dexcom sank 5.1%.
Chipmakers — Chip equipment stocks ASML Holding, KLA, Lam Research and Applied Materials all dropped following a report that Taiwan Semiconductor is telling vendors to delay deliveries due to demand concerns. U.S.-listed shares of Taiwan Semiconductor lost 2.4%.
Adobe — Shares of the Photoshop maker dropped 4.2% following Adobe’s fiscal third-quarter earnings Thursday. The company reported an earnings and revenue beat and forward guidance that matched Street projections. While Goldman Sachs and Bank of America reiterated buy ratings, JPMorgan remained neutral, citing macroeconomic headwinds and a high premium for Adobe’s pending acquisition of Figma for $20 billion.
Apellis Pharmaceuticals — The biopharmaceutical company advanced 2.6% following a Wells Fargo upgrade to overweight from equal weight. The bank said Apellis has a favorable risk/reward ahead of third-quarter earnings.
DoorDash — Shares of the food delivery company fell 2.5% after MoffettNathanson downgraded the stock to market perform from outperform. The Wall Street firm said the resumption of loan repayments introduce bookings risk to food delivery. The stock is still up more than 60% this year.
Axis Capital — The insurance stock rose 3.1% following an upgrade to buy from underperform by Bank of America. The Wall Street firm said its pessimistic outlook was changing despite recent underperformance in the reinsurance space.
Estée Lauder — The cosmetics stock advanced nearly 1% after Redburn Atlantic Equities turned less bearish. The firm upgrades shares to neutral from sell, saying the company was feeling technical benefits as customer ordering patterns normalize.
Casella Waste Systems — The waste stock traded about 1.6% higher after getting initiated by Goldman Sachs at buy. Goldman called the company a “compounder with pricing.”
— CNBC’s Yun Li, Jesse Pound, Samantha Subin, Pia Singh, Brian Evans and Lisa Kailai Han contributed reporting. More

Former President Donald Trump indicated that if he gets another term, he might pressure Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell to loosen monetary policy.
Asked specifically whether he would try to strong-arm Powell into lowering rates, Trump said, “Depends where inflation is. But I would get inflation down.”
Using the platform formerly known as Twitter, Trump while in office often berated Fed officials, once calling them “boneheads.”

Former President Donald Trump speaks with the press at the Iowa Pork Producers booth during the 2023 Iowa State Fair at the Iowa State Fairgrounds, Aug. 12, 2023.
Demetrius Freeman | The Washington Post | Getty Images

Former President Donald Trump complained that interest rates are too high and indicated that if he gets another term in office, he might pressure Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell to loosen monetary policy.
In an interview set to air Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Trump also hinted that he would at least consider removing Powell.

“Interest rates are very high. They’re too high. People can’t buy homes. They can’t do anything. I mean, they can’t borrow money,” Trump told MTP host Kristen Welker during her premiere on the long-running talk show. Welker replaces Chuck Todd, who hosted his final show last week.
Asked specifically by Welker whether he would try to strong-arm Powell into lowering rates, Trump said, “Depends where inflation is. But I would get inflation down.”

A history of conflict

The remarks harken back to the contentious relationship the two officials had when Trump served from 2017-2021.
Using the platform formerly known as Twitter, Trump often berated Fed officials, once calling them “boneheads,” and compared Powell to “a golfer who can’t putt.” Those remarks came while the Fed was raising interest rates in 2018 and 2019.
“We do know that I put a lot of pressure on him,” Trump told Welker. “It was outside pressure, because nobody knows whether or not you can really do that, but I did, because I thought his interest rates were too high. And he ultimately dropped his interest rates.”

Indeed, the Fed began cutting rates in 2019, ultimately taking its benchmark borrowing rate down to near-zero as the Covid pandemic hit in March 2020.
Trump’s criticism of the Fed came even though he appointed Powell, who was confirmed in 2018, to succeed Janet Yellen, who went on to become Treasury secretary under President Joe Biden.
Asked whether he might try to replace Powell should he be re-elected in 2024, Trump hedged.
“Well, I guess he would have two years left or something like that, so we’ll see,” he said.
“You know the word jawboning? I did a lot of jawboning against him, and he ultimately lowered interest rates. We had lower interest rates. We had the best housing market ever. We had people buying homes,” he added. “Things are not going, right now, very well for the consumer. Bacon is up five times. Food is up horribly, worse than energy.”

‘I would get inflation down’

Inflation has been a major problem during the Biden administration after staying benign under Trump and, before that, Barack Obama.
The consumer price index has risen more than 16% in just over 2 ½ years of the Biden presidency; it was up less than half that for the entirety of Trump’s presidency.
However, economists largely agree that the seeds were planted for higher prices in the early days of the Covid crisis, when supply chains froze, consumer demand switched from services to goods, and Congress and the Fed injected trillions of dollars in stimulus in an effort to combat the pandemic’s economic impact.
Trump vowed that he would lower inflation.
“I would get inflation down, because drill we must. We will be drilling for oil. We are going to become, again, energy independent. We are going to reduce our debt, because we’re also going to become energy dominant,” he said.
The Fed meets next week and is expected to hold rates steady. Powell’s term expires in February 2026. More

Federal student loan borrowers are at risk of scams when payments restart in October, the Federal Trade Commission said.
Student loan payments have been paused for more than three years during the Covid-19 pandemic. The pause has been extended eight times.
The Federal Student Aid website studentaid.gov is the best source of information about loans, the FTC said.

Juan Algar | Moment | Getty Images

Student loan payments are restarting in October after a pause of more than three years — and scammers are trying to take advantage, the Federal Trade Commission warned.
Fraudsters may try mislead borrowers by offering assistance and asking them to pay for it, Ari Lazarus, consumer education specialist at the FTC, wrote in a consumer alert Thursday. Those fake offers might include lowering borrowers’ monthly payments, avoiding repayment or getting their loans forgiven.

“Worried about repaying your loans? The calls and texts that offer ‘help’ might be tempting,” the alert said. “But before you act, know how to spot the scams.”
More from Personal Finance:Some student loan holders may be able to tap 529 plansFirst Frisco school savings account holders head to collegeThe biggest downside to 529 plans is about to go away
The suspension of federal student loan payments began in March 2020, one of many tranches of government aid meant to alleviate financial pressures on households at the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic.
The pause has since been extended eight times, twice by the Trump administration and six times by the Biden administration. Interest on federal student debt was also suspended during this period but started accruing again on Sept. 1.
The “best source” of information on federal student loans is the Federal Student Aid website, studentaid.gov, the FTC said.

The agency offered two tips to avoid falling victim to a scam:

Don’t give away your FSA ID login information. Only scammers will ask for this. They can cut off contact between borrowers and their loan servicer, and perhaps even steal their identity.

Don’t trust people who promise debt relief or loan forgiveness, even if they claim to be from the U.S. Department of Education. Special access to repayment plans or forgiveness options doesn’t exist. Instead, log into your student loan account to review your options. More

General Motors assembly workers picket outside the General Motors Bowling Green plant during the United Auto Workers national strike in Bowling Green, Kentucky, October 10, 2019.
Bryan Woolston | Reuters

Check out the companies making headlines before the bell.
KeyCorp — The Cleveland-based regional bank rose almost 2% premarket after Piper Sandler said the shares have begun to recover and it’s growing “more comfortable” with its profit estimates. Piper upgraded KeyCorp to overweight from neutral.

Keysight Technologies — Shares added about 1.5% after Morgan Stanley upgraded the test and measurement equipment maker to overweight from equal weight. The investment bank said Keysight’s current valuation doesn’t reflect its double-digit earnings growth.
Apellis Pharmaceuticals — The biopharmaceutical company climbed 3.5% before the open after Wells Fargo upgraded to overweight from equal weight. The bank aid Apellis offers a favorable risk-reward ahead of third-quarter earnings.
General Motors, Ford, Stellantis — GM and Ford fell less than 1% and Stellantis rose less than 1% after the United Auto Workers went on strike Thursday night. About 12,700 workers at three key assembly plants walked out, according to the union.
Unity Software — Shares in the video game developer stock added almost 3% premarket on the heels of an upgrade to buy from Bank of America. A stable advertising business, better monetized game engine, priced-in “risks and execution issues” and “potential upside” to 2024-2025 earnings estimates underpinned the upgrade.
DoorDash — Shares of the food delivery company slid almost 3% premarket after MoffettNathanson downgraded DoorDash to market perform to outperform. The research firm said that the resumption of student loan payments could hurt food delivery demand.

Arm Holdings — Shares of the semiconductor and software stock gained 5.4% premarket after its rally on Thursday, when the company made its Nasdaq debut through an initial public offering and jumped nearly 25%. Needham initiated coverage of the British company with a hold rating, saying Arm’s valuation looks “full” in a post-smartphone era.
Adobe — Shares fell 3.4% on the back of the company’s fiscal third-quarter earnings report Thursday. Earnings and revenue at the PhotoShop and Acrobat maker beat analysts’ estimates and forward guidance matched Street projections. While Goldman Sachs and Bank of America reiterated buy ratings, JPMorgan remained neutral, citing macroeconomic headwinds and a high premium for Adobe’s pending acquisition of Figma for $20 billion.
Nucor — The steelmaker fell 2.3% before the open after issuing weaker-than-expected earnings guidance for the third quarter, citing weaker pricing and volumes. Nucor forecast earnings between $4.10 and $4.20 per share, versus the $4.57 expected by analysts polled by LSEG.
— CNBC’s Brian Evans, Michelle Fox, Alex Harring, Hakyung Kim, Tanaya Macheel, Jesse Pound and Pia Singh contributed reporting More

Yum China operates KFC and Pizza Hut stores in China.
CEO Joey Wat told CNBC in an interview Friday the company is spending more on tech, an investment that’s allowed it to open more stores without having to hire more staff.
Yum China is also considering the use of generative AI to help store managers understand and analyze store data better, Wat said, emphasizing it’s still at a “very, very early stage.”

Pedestrians walk past a Pizza Hut restaurant and a KFC restaurant, both operated by Yum China, in Beijing, China, on Sept. 5, 2020.
Bloomberg | Bloomberg | Getty Images

BEIJING — Yum China is spending more on tech, an investment that’s allowed it to open more stores without having to hire more staff, CEO Joey Wat told CNBC in an interview Friday.
Yum China operates KFC and Pizza Hut stores in China, among other brands. Its U.S.-listed shares rose by 5.45% Thursday after the company increased its net new stores target for the year by 300 — and plans to return $3 billion to shareholders over the next three years.

“From 2016 to now we increased our number of stores by about 80%. However, our number of staff almost stayed flat [around] 430,000 people,” Wat said via video conference.
With technology, she said staff can be promoted to manage multiple stores and support the opening of new locations.
Yum China said Thursday it plans to invest $3.5 billion to $5 billion over the next three years to grow its store network, improve its supply chain and boost digital capabilities. This year alone, the company plans to spend about $700 million to $900 million.

Wat said the company began to invest in technology during the Covid-19 pandemic to improve visibility into its supply chain and inventory levels in a period when certain stores might need to close due to lockdown controls.
Companies from Alibaba to Walmart’s Sam’s Club have been using software to manage warehouses and supermarket inventory in China — to sell services such as one-hour grocery delivery.

Yum China is building more of its own logistics centers where it can integrate more technology into its supply chain and reduce carbon emissions, Wat said, noting the company ultimately aims to own 30% of its logistics centers rather than having to rent them.

AI at work

As a result, store managers don’t have to order inventory anymore — ingredients are automatically pushed to the store with the help of artificial intelligence-based forecasting, Wat said.
That tech reduces labor and operating costs, as well as food waste, she said. Wat added that current logistics center coverage also has the capacity to serve Yum China’s planned store openings in the near term.
The company has 33 logistics centers, and plans to increase that number to at least 45 in the next three to five years.
Yum China is also considering the use of generative AI to help store managers understand and analyze store data better, Wat said, emphasizing it’s still at a “very, very early stage.”
She said the company is still assessing what can be done in-house, and what requires external help.
Generative AI uses large models to create content that can resemble what a human being might produce — but in a far shorter time frame.

Consumer trends

To meet such tech investment and company growth goals, Wat did not specify whether Yum China would hire more staff. “We will hire whoever we need to hire,” she said.
She claimed the company didn’t lay any people off, not even during the three years of the pandemic.
China’s broader economic recovery from Covid lockdowns has slowed in recent months. The latest available data for young people ages 16 to 24 showed a jobless rate of around 20% this summer, while the overall unemployment rate in cities has been far lower near 5.2%.
Overall uncertainty about future income has weighed on consumer spending.
Despite business expansion, Yum China said it expects same-store sales this year to reach 90% of 2019 levels.
Wat noted that Yum China opened more than half of its stores after 2019, and that its stores are roughly split between the country’s larger cities and less developed areas.
She described summer business as a peak time for the company, especially with local tourism, and said transactions remained “solid” in September after the start of the school year.
Yum China also has a local joint venture with Italian coffee brand Lavazza, which now has more than 100 stores in China.
Wat said that in addition to coffee, the company is exploring how to introduce more food products for the brand in China. More

Retail sales grew by 4.6% in August from a year ago, beating expectations for 3% growth forecast by a Reuters poll. The increase was also faster than the 2.5% year-on-year pace in July.
The National Bureau of Statistics last month stopped reporting the unemployment rate for young people ages 16 to 24.
Late Thursday, the People’s Bank of China said that it was cutting the amount of cash that banks need to have on hand by 25 basis points, effective Friday. It was the second reserve requirement ratio cut this year since one in March.

BEIJING — China’s retail sales and industrial production picked up pace in August with better-than-expected growth, according to National Bureau of Statistics data released Friday.
Retail sales grew by 4.6% in August from a year ago, beating expectations for 3% growth forecast by a Reuters poll. The increase was also faster than the 2.5% year-on-year pace in July.

Industrial production grew by 4.5% in August from a year ago, better than the 3.9% forecast and faster than the 3.7% increase reported for July.
Within that category, the value added of equipment manufacturing rose by 5.4% from a year ago. The output of solar cells and service robots surged by more than 70% from a year ago.
The latest industrial production and services output figures indicate Oxford Economics’ third-quarter GDP forecast is intact, and steady activity would mean the economy can reach 5.1% growth this year, said its lead economist Louise Loo in a report Friday.

Fixed asset investment, however, grew by 3.2% year-on-year in August on a year-to-date basis. That missed expectations for a 3.3% increase and was slower than the 3.4% pace reported as of July.
The figure was dragged down by a steeper drop in real estate investment, and a slowdown in infrastructure investment. Only manufacturing saw the pace of investment pick up.

Statistics bureau spokesperson Fu Linghui said the real estate market was still in a period of “adjustment” and noted declines in sales and investment. He said the property sector would recover as recent policy took effect.

The key is to maintain the shape and pace of the economic recovery so that companies are willing to continue investing and residents are willing to continue consuming.

Bruce Pang
chief economist and head of research for Greater China, JLL

In the first 10 days of September, average daily new home sales fell by 19.3% from a year ago, better than the 24% decline in August, according to a Nomura report, citing a Wind Information survey of 21 major cities in China.
“It’s too early to conclude that property easing hasn’t been effective — the most meaningful property easing measures had been implemented end-Aug/early-Sep after all, including nationwide mortgage loosening initiatives and measures across all four Tier-1 cities,” Oxford Economics’ Loo said.

Private sector investment drops

Within fixed asset investment, private, non-state investment fell by 0.7% in the first eight months of the year from a year ago — worse than the 0.5% decline in the first seven months of the year.
That decline reflects weak sentiment about the future, said Bruce Pang, chief economist and head of research for Greater China at JLL.
He said it will take time for recent policy and measures to take effect.
“The key is to maintain the shape and pace of the economic recovery so that companies are willing to continue investing and residents are willing to continue consuming, forming a virtuous cycle and a balanced recovery,” Pang said in Chinese, translated by CNBC.
The urban unemployment rate for cities was little changed at 5.2%. The statistics bureau again did not report the jobless rate for young people.

It said last month it will stop reporting the unemployment rate for young people ages 16 to 24. The bureau said it was reassessing its methodology, and would resume releases at an unspecified date.
While spokesperson Fu said the bureau didn’t yet have a figure to share, he added that data from some departments showed more young people were able to get jobs in August.
He noted that pressure on employment remains, and more effort is needed to expand the number and quality of jobs.
China’s economic rebound from the pandemic has slowed since the second quarter, dragged down by a real estate slump. Exports, another key driver of China’s economy, have also dropped as global demand for Chinese goods wanes.
The statistics bureau release described August data as showing “marginal improvement.”
“The national economy showed good momentum of recovery with high-quality development making solid progress and positive factors accumulated,” the statistics bureau release said. “However, we should be aware that many unstable and uncertain factors in the external environment still exist.”

Workers make pods for e-cigarettes on the production line at Kanger Tech, one of China’s leading manufacturers of vaping products, on September 24, 2019 in Shenzhen, China.
Kevin Frayer | Getty Images News | Getty Images

Within retail sales, online sales of physical goods rose by 7.6% in August from a year ago, according to CNBC calculations of official data accessed via Wind.
Autos saw sales rise by 1.1%. Among the categories with faster growth were cosmetics, up by 9.7% and communication equipment, up by 8.5% in August from a year ago. Catering sales grew by 12.4% during that time.
Services sector retail sales grew by 19.4% in the January to August period from a year ago, slower than the 20.3% pace recorded for the period through July.

More rate cuts

Late Thursday, the People’s Bank of China said that it was cutting the amount of cash that banks need to have on hand by 25 basis points, effective Friday. It was the second reserve requirement ratio cut this year since one in March.
In the last several weeks, Beijing has announced a slew of measures to support the real estate market and consumption.

Monetary policy has remained relatively loose compared with aggressive rate hikes in the U.S. and Europe.
Also effective Friday is a reduction in the foreign exchange reserve requirement ratio for financial institutions to 4%, from 6%. The planned cut was announced two weeks ago.
The central bank has also trimmed other benchmark rates, such as the one-year loan prime rate.

China’s slowing economic growth

Moody’s on Thursday downgraded its outlook on China’s property sector to negative from stable. The firm expects sales to fall by around 5% over the next six to 12 months.
“While the Chinese government has recently strengthened policy support for the property sector, we expect the impact on property sales to be short-lived and differentiated between tiers of cities,” Cedric Lai, vice president and senior analyst at Moody’s, said in a release.
Uncertainty about future income has kept consumer spending relatively muted.
China’s consumer price index rose by 0.1% year-on-year in August, reversing a decline in July. Core CPI, which excludes food and energy prices, increased by the same 0.8% year-on-year pace during both months. More