In Hong Kong, the Hang Seng Index added 1.6 percent, to 19,228.55 points, while the Hong Kong China Enterprises Index gained 3.0 percent, to 8,099.65.
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The monthly foreign trade surplus widened 12.2 per cent year on year to 406.2 billion yuan ($62.38 billion) in January, up from 382 billion yuan a month earlier, according to the General Administration of Customs (GAC).
Separately, total social financing – an alternative measure of credit in the real economy – reached 3.42 trillion yuan in January, the central People’s Bank of China (PBoC) said in a statement on its website.
Zhou Xiaochuan, governor of the People’s Bank of China, blamed “speculative forces” for attacking the value of the yuan, insisting that there won’t be further depreciation when trading recommences tomorrow after a week-long holiday.
Imports fell sharply 14.4 percent year-on-year to 738 billion yuan in January, Customs said, a worsening of the 4 percent decline in yuan terms the month before.
MILAN, Feb. 9 (Xinhua) – A number of Italian experts and entrepreneurs are not anxious about the economic slowdown of China, which they said still makes sizable contributions to the global economic growth and has considerable development potential.
Hao Zhou, senior economist at Commerzbank AG in Singapore said, “The weak trade numbers indicate that the recovery in December’s trade figures was largely due to a front-loading effect, rather than improving demand”. New yuan loans jumped to 2.51 trillion yuan, also a record and beating the median estimate of 1.9 trillion yuan.
China’s foreign-exchange reserves shrank in January to their lowest level since 2012, as the central bank continues to sell large sums of USA dollars to prop up its currency – now at a 5-year low.
“China has without any doubt become one of the most reliable economies in the world”, said Yao, citing the country’s stable economic growth, foreign exchange reserves, low debt rate and widened global trade surplus. “Stripping out the seasonal effects, growth in outstanding loans rose from 14.3% year-on-year in December to 15.3% year-on-year last month”.
Services for the first time generated more than half of China’s gross domestic product previous year, at 50.5 percent.
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Exports fell 11.2 per cent in United States dollar terms compared to a year ago, as the weaker yuan over the past six months failed to give Chinese factories a competitive boost.
