China industrial output, retail sales growth beat expectations in August

China's industrial output grew 4.5 per cent in August from a year earlier, accelerating from the 3.7 per cent pace seen in July, suggesting that the recent flurry of support measures may be starting to slowly stabilise a stumbling economic recovery.

The data released on Friday by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) beat expectations for a 3.9 per cent increase in a Reuters poll of analysts, and marked the quickest rate since April.

Retail sales, a gauge of consumption, also grew at a faster 4.6 per cent pace in August aided by the summer travel season, and was the quickest growth since May. That compared with a 2.5 per cent increase in July, and an expected 3 per cent increase.

Fixed asset investment expanded 3.2 per cent in the first eight months of 2023 from the same period a year earlier, versus expectations for a 3.3 per cent rise. It grew 3.4 per cent in the January-July period.

The figures followed better-than-expected bank lending data, narrowing in the declines of exports and imports as well as easing deflationary pressure, indicating tentative signs of stabilisation in China's sputtering economy.

All the same, an ailing property sector, high youth unemployment, uncertainty around household consumption and rising Sino-U.S. tensions over trade, technology and geopolitics have raised the bar for a durable economic recovery in the near future.