MNI DATA IMPACT: China Oct Spending Up, Catering Rises Again

China's industrial sector is recovering steadily at a relatively fast pace, while the services sector accelerated significantly in October with a holiday boost, said Fu Linghui, the spokesman of the National Bureau of Statistic at a data release briefing on Monday.

"The unbalanced recovery of the economy has been adjusted," said Fu, pointing to the further warming in consumption. He noted that catering revenue turned positive for the first time this year with a 0.8% gain, indicating increasing consumer confidence.

Here are some of the data highlights:

• Industrial production grew for the seventh month by 6.9% y/y in Oct, flat from the gain in Sep and outperforming the 6.6% forecast. Accumulated growth for the first ten months rose 1.8% y/y, further accelerating from the previous 1.2% growth.
• Retail sales rose 4.3% y/y in Oct, further expanding from the 3.3% gain in Sep, though shy of the 4.9% projected result.
• Fixed-asset Investment continued to rise 1.8% y/y in the Jan-Oct period, after turning positive for the first time this year to grow 0.8% over the first three quarters. The figure outshone the projected 1.6% gain.
• The recovery in manufacturing investment remain slow, with a fall of 5.3% following the 6.5% decline in Jan-Sep. Infrastructure investment rose 0.7% after reversing the previous fall with a 0.2% gain in Jan-Sep, and property investment growth expanded to 6.3% y/y, growing for the fifth month from the previous 5.6%.
• Registered urban unemployment edged down 0.1 percentage point to 5.3% from Sept. The rate in 31 major cities was also down 0.2 pp to 5.3%.