Chinese economic outlook weakens as industrial, retail data disappoints
By Benjamin Chiou
Date: Friday 15 Aug 2025
(Sharecast News) - A trio of leading economic indicators from China came in below estimates on Friday, with industrial production, retail sales and fixed asset investment figures all showing weaker rates of growth in July.
Industrial production grew at a year-on-year rate of 5.7% last month, down from 6.8% in June, according to the National Bureau of Statistics.
This was below the 5.9% increase expected by economists and the slowest rate registered since November 2024, as manufacturing activity was dampened by flooding across the country and a record-breaking heatwave.
Mining production was up 5% compared with last year, manufacturing increased by 6.2% while the production and supply of electricity, heat power, gas and water rose 3.3%.
Analysts at TD Securities said they expected industrial production growth to stay strong at around 6.3% after export data for July surprised to the upside.
While Donald Trump earlier this week agreed to extend a tariff truce with China for another 90 days (to 10 November), TD Securities said it expected Chinese firms would have benefitted from frontloading of orders ahead of the original 12 August deadline to raise tariffs. However, this clearly did not materialise as expected.
Retail sales also disappointed, rising by just 3.7% over last year, down from 4.8% growth in June. This came in well below the 4.6% increase expected by the market, with growth slowing to its lowest since December 2024.
Meanwhile, fixed asset investment statistics showed just a 1.6% year-on-year increase over the January to July period, slowing down markedly from the 2.8% growth registered over the first six months of the year. The consensus estimate was 2.7%.
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