HONG KONG \u2014 China said Monday its economy grew 4.5 per cent in the July-September quarter from a year ago fueled by robust exports, moving closer to meeting its official annual growth target for the year as trading partners seek to balance their trade deficits with the country.<\/p>\n
Economic growth accelerated from the 4.3 per cent year-on-year rate recorded in the April-June quarter, the slowest expansion in more than three years. Its economy expanded 4.6 per cent in the first three quarters.<\/p>\n
For the whole year, Chinese leaders have set a growth target of 4.5 per cent to 5 per cent, down from last year\u2019s 5 per cent expansion. Earlier this month, the International Monetary Fund trimmed its forecast for China\u2019s 2026 economic growth to 4.5 per cent, the lower end of Beijing\u2019s goal.<\/p>\n
\u201cDomestic demand was weak, while trade grew strongly,\u201d said Dave Chia, an economist at Moody\u2019s Analytics. Exports will likely stay strong but global trade barriers remain a risk, he said.<\/p>\n
Exports are strong, but domestic sluggishness remains<\/p>\n
China\u2019s domestic demand has been weighed down by a yearslong downturn in its property market.<\/p>\n
The headline official growth figure is becoming \u201can increasingly poor indicator of how the broader economy is performing,\u201d said Max Zenglein, Asia Pacific senior economist at The Conference Board.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s because it masks \u201cwidening disparities across industries, regions, and households,\u201d Zenglein said. Beijing faces difficult trade-offs and managing domestic imbalances may prove more challenging than dealing with external pressures, he added.<\/p>\n
On Monday, Mao Shengyong, deputy head of China\u2019s National Bureau of Statistics, cautioned of the economic challenges ahead. \u201cThe international environment is complex and volatile, the problem of insufficient domestic demand remains relatively prominent and the foundation for a stable, improving economy still needs consolidation,\u201d he told a news conference.<\/p>\n
With exports being one of the few bright spots, China is on track to surpass last year\u2019s record $1.2 trillion trade surplus globally, after logging a 36 per cent growth in exports last month and already a $938 billion surplus between January and September.<\/p>\n
Elevated U.S. tariffs have hit some U.S.-China bilateral trade and forced China to look elsewhere, including Southeast Asia, Latin America and Europe. High-tech exports such as semiconductors and autos, including hybrid and electric vehicles, are among areas driving its export growth this year.<\/p>\n
As China pursues self-sufficiency to help shield itself from Western export controls and trade uncertainties, it has built up massive domestic manufacturing capacities across industries such as solar and EVs, which are heavily subsidized by the government. But output was scaled up rapidly at a time of weakened domestic consumption, so many of these goods are shipped to overseas markets at competitive prices.<\/p>\n
An export-reliant growth model that\u2019s highly tech-driven has shown limited job creation and broad income gains while risks of artificial intelligence-driven labor displacements continue to grow, said Ecaterina Bigos, senior market strategist at BNP Paribas Asset Management.<\/p>\n
China faces growing pressure from the EU to rebalance trade<\/p>\n
Many trade partners fear their domestic industries and economies face growing threats from lower-cost Chinese manufactured imports.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is untenable and unsustainable for the world\u2019s second largest economy to rely on foreign demand to prop up its own growth,\u201d said Eswar Prasad, a professor of economics and trade policy at Cornell University.<\/p>\n
Through its persistent and large trade surpluses, China \u201chas become a drag on world growth rather than an engine that pulls the rest of the world along,\u201d Prasad said.<\/p>\n
The European Union is among those impatient to reduce its trade imbalance with China. The 27-nation bloc runs a trade deficit with China of more than $1.1 billion a day.<\/p>\n
For the first nine months of the year, Chinese exports to the EU were up 16 per cent. EU countries are eyeing more curbs on China after the EU reached an agreement with China this month to roughly halve the number of Chinese hybrid vehicle imports over the next few years.<\/p>\n
China can work with other countries on disputes and it wants to keep its market access, said Gary Ng, a senior economist for Asia Pacific at French bank Natixis. With a deal with the EU on hybrid cars, for example, China can likely still sell more made-by-China products in the longer run while avoiding a broad tariff hike.<\/p>\n
Even with agreements made between China and the EU, \u201ctrade imbalances will be difficult to resolve quickly,\u201d said Lynn Song, chief economist for Greater China at Dutch bank ING.<\/p>\n
Policymakers say an undervalued yuan, China\u2019s currency, against the dollar and the euro has contributed to China\u2019s growing trade surplus, even though China\u2019s central bank has dismissed the claims.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are likely to see continued resistance, rising protectionism, and persistent pressure from economies globally to protect their industries, and jobs, notably in high value sectors,\u201d noted Bigos.<\/p>\n
China insists that it does not seek a large trade surplus. Central bank governor Pan Gongsheng said Friday that countries with trade deficits and those with trade surpluses should work together, and that China, as a responsible country, is committed to expanding domestic demand.<\/p>\n
Chan Ho-him, The Associated Press<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"HONG KONG \u2014 China said Monday its economy grew 4.5 per cent in the July-September quarter from a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":938757,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[45,49,48,46,77],"class_list":["post-938756","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy","tag-business","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-economy","tag-international"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/938756","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=938756"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/938756\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/938757"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=938756"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=938756"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=938756"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}