Text: Yan Xiang, Xu Ruchun
On May 17, the National Bureau of Statistics released economic growth data for April.
The core conclusion: industrial production has accelerated, and equipment manufacturing has grown rapidly. In April, the added value of industrial enterprises above designated size increased by 6.7 percent year-on-year, 2.2 percentage points faster than the previous month. On a month-on-month basis, in April, the added value of industrial enterprises above designated size increased by 0.97% over the previous month. From a structural point of view, the year-on-year growth rate of the added value of the three major categories of industries has accelerated. In terms of different industries, the added value of equipment manufacturing and high-tech manufacturing increased rapidly year-on-year.
Consumption grew steadily. In April, the total retail sales of consumer goods reached 3,569.9 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 2.3 percent, compared with 3.1 percent in March. The decline in consumption growth is mainly due to the impact of the higher base brought about by the wrong month of the holiday, according to the calculation of the Bureau of Statistics, the year-on-year growth rate of total retail sales of consumer goods has fallen by more than 1 percentage point. Consumption of services is growing well. In terms of consumption categories, retail sales of goods continued to grow in April, with a year-on-year increase of 2.0%, the potential of service consumption continued to be released, catering revenue increased by 4.4%, and retail sales of services from January to April increased by 8.4% year-on-year; In terms of contribution, in April, commodity retail sales drove the total retail sales of social consumption to increase by 1.8 percentage points, and catering revenue drove the total retail sales of social consumption to increase by 0.5 percentage points. The scale of investment has expanded, and private investment has maintained growth. From January to April, the national investment in fixed assets (excluding rural households) increased by 4.2% year-on-year, a slight slowdown of 0.3 percentage points from the first quarter. Among them, private investment in fixed assets increased by 0.3% year-on-year, and if real estate development investment is deducted, private investment increased by 7.2% year-on-year. The manufacturing industry maintained a relatively high growth rate. From January to April, manufacturing investment increased by 9.7 percent, a slight decrease of 0.2 percentage points from the first quarter, and the cumulative year-on-year growth rate of infrastructure investment (excluding electric hot water) was 6.0 percent, and 6.5 percent in the first quarter. Through the cumulative growth rate backwards, the year-on-year growth rates of manufacturing investment and infrastructure investment (excluding electricity, heating, gas and water) in April were 9.3% and 5.1% respectively. The real estate market is still in a correction phase. On the supply side, the growth rate of real estate development investment continued to decline, and the overall willingness to start construction investment was still low. From January to April, the national real estate development investment fell by 9.8% year-on-year, and the area of new construction started decreased by 24.6% year-on-year; The area of housing completions decreased by 20.4% year-on-year. On the demand side, the sales of commercial housing across the country were weak in April, and housing prices continued to adjust. From January to April, the sales area of newly built commercial housing decreased by 20.2% year-on-year; In terms of prices, in April, among the 70 large and medium-sized cities, the sales prices of commercial housing in all tiers of cities decreased month-on-month and year-on-year. Risk warning: First, geopolitical risks exceed expectations; Second, the macro economy is less than expected; Third, there are large fluctuations in overseas markets. The main body of the report
1. Industrial production has accelerated, and equipment manufacturing has grown rapidly
In April, the added value of industrial enterprises above designated size increased by 6.7 percent year-on-year in real terms (the growth rate of added value is the real growth rate after deducting price factors), 2.2 percentage points faster than that of the previous month. On a month-on-month basis, in April, the added value of industrial enterprises above designated size increased by 0.97% over the previous month. From January to April, the added value of industrial enterprises above designated size increased by 6.3 percent year-on-year, 0.2 percentage points faster than that in the first quarter.
From a structural point of view, the year-on-year growth rate of the added value of the three major categories of industries has accelerated. In April, the added value of the mining industry increased by 2.0 percent year-on-year, 1.8 percentage points faster than that in March, and the manufacturing industry increased by 7.5 percent, compared with 5.1 percent in March. The production and supply of electricity, heat, gas and water increased by 5.8 percent, 0.9 percentage points faster than in March.
Specifically, the added value of equipment manufacturing and high-tech manufacturing increased rapidly year-on-year. In April, the added value of the equipment manufacturing industry increased by 9.9 percent, an increase of 3.9 percentage points over the previous month, and the added value of the high-tech manufacturing industry increased by 11.3 percent, an increase of 3.7 percentage points. Specifically, the added value of the manufacturing of computers, communications and other electronic equipment increased by 15.6 percent year-on-year, an increase of 5.0 percentage points, the manufacturing of railways, ships, aerospace and other transportation equipment increased by 13.2 percent year-on-year, an increase of 4.6 percentage points, and the automobile manufacturing industry increased by 16.3 percent year-on-year, an increase of 6.9 percentage points.
2 Consumption grew steadily, and service consumption grew well
In April, the total retail sales of consumer goods reached 3,569.9 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 2.3 percent, compared with 3.1 percent in March. Among them, the retail sales of consumer goods other than automobiles were 3,219.6 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 3.2%. From January to April, the total retail sales of consumer goods 156026 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 4.1%, a slight decrease of 0.6 percentage points from the first quarter. Among them, the retail sales of consumer goods other than automobiles 141396 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 4.3%. The decline in consumption growth is mainly due to the impact of the higher base brought about by the wrong month of the holiday, according to the calculation of the Bureau of Statistics, the year-on-year growth rate of total retail sales of consumer goods has fallen by more than 1 percentage point.
In terms of consumption categories, retail sales of goods continued to grow, and the potential of service consumption continued to be released. Judging from the contribution of the month, the increase in the growth rate of social consumption in April still mainly benefited from the pull of commodity sales. In April, the retail sales of goods were 3,178.4 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 2.0 percent, and 2.7 percent in March; catering revenue was 391.5 billion yuan, an increase of 4.4 percent, compared with 6.9 percent in March. From January to April, the retail sales of goods 138666 billion yuan, an increase of 3.5%; catering revenue was 1,736 billion yuan, an increase of 9.3 percent, and retail sales of services increased by 8.4 percent year-on-year. From the perspective of the contribution of the month, in April, the retail sales of goods drove the total retail sales of social consumption to increase by 1.8 percentage points, and the total retail sales of catering revenue drove the growth of 0.5 percentage points.
From the perspective of enterprise scale, the year-on-year growth of retail sales of goods mainly came from enterprises above designated size, and the retail sales of small enterprises above designated size showed negative year-on-year growth. In April, the retail sales of goods increased by 62.5 billion yuan compared with the same period last year, of which the retail value of enterprises above designated size increased by 147.9 billion yuan year-on-year, and the retail sales value of enterprises above designated size decreased by 85.4 billion yuan year-on-year.
From the perspective of the categories of commodities above designated size, the sales of basic living goods and some upgraded commodities grew rapidly. Specifically, the retail sales of communication equipment, sports and recreational goods, grains and oils, food, and beverages of units above designated size increased by 13.3 percent, 12.7 percent, 8.5 percent, and 6.4 percent respectively.
3. The scale of investment has expanded, and the manufacturing industry has maintained a relatively high growth rate
From January to April, the national investment in fixed assets (excluding rural households) was 143401 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 4.2% (calculated on a comparable basis), a slight slowdown of 0.3 percentage points from the first quarter. On a month-on-month basis, investment in fixed assets (excluding rural households) fell by 0.03% in April.
Private investment maintained positive year-on-year growth, and the private economy continued to recover and develop. From January to April, private investment in fixed assets was 7,391.3 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 0.3 percent, a slight decrease of 0.2 percentage points from the first quarter. If real estate development investment is deducted, private investment increased by 7.2% year-on-year. In terms of proportion, as of April, private investment accounted for 51.5% of fixed assets this year, which was basically stable compared with the first quarter.
In terms of categories, manufacturing investment continued to grow at a relatively high rate, infrastructure investment maintained stable growth, and the growth rate of infrastructure investment and manufacturing industry was higher than the growth rate of all investment. From January to April, manufacturing investment increased by 9.7 percent, a slight decrease of 0.2 percentage points from the first quarter, and the cumulative year-on-year growth rate of infrastructure investment was 7.78 percent, excluding the production and supply of electricity, heat, gas and water, infrastructure investment increased by 6.0 percent year-on-year, and 6.5 percent in the first quarter. Through the cumulative growth rate backwards, the year-on-year growth rates of manufacturing investment and infrastructure investment (excluding electricity, heat, gas and water) in April were 9.3% and 5.1% respectively, down 1.0 and 1.5 percentage points respectively from March.
The growth rate of real estate development investment continued to decline, and the overall willingness to start construction investment was still low. From January to April, the national real estate development investment was 3,092.8 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 9.8% (calculated on a comparable basis), compared with the decline of 9.5% in the first quarter, which continued to expand by 0.3 percentage points, and continued to grind the bottom. From January to April, the area of new construction started decreased by 24.6% year-on-year; The area of housing completions decreased by 20.4% year-on-year. From the perspective of changes in the month, in April, the year-on-year growth rate of real estate development investment was -7.3%, up 9.5 percentage points from March, and the area of new construction and completion fell by 12.3% and 15.4% respectively in the month, both of which were marginally improved from March.
On the demand side, the sales of commercial housing across the country were weak in April, and housing prices continued to adjust. From January to April, the sales area of newly built commercial buildings was 292.52 million square meters, a year-on-year decrease of 20.2%, a slight increase of 0.8 percentage points from the decline of 19.4% in the first quarter, of which the sales area of residential buildings decreased by 23.8%. In April, the year-on-year growth rate of commercial housing sales area was -14.4%, maintaining a large decline but also marginally improving compared with March. From the price side, in April, among the 70 large and medium-sized cities, the month-on-month and year-on-year declines in the sales prices of commercial housing in all tiers of cities expanded, down 0.58% and 3.51% respectively. Among them, from a month-on-month perspective, Beijing, Guangzhou and Shenzhen decreased by 0.7%, 1.3% and 1.0% respectively, and Shanghai rose by 0.3%; On a year-on-year basis, Beijing, Guangzhou and Shenzhen fell by 0.5%, 6.9% and 6.7% respectively, while Shanghai rose by 4.2%.
4 Risk Warning
First, geopolitical risks exceed expectations; Second, the macro economy is less than expected; Third, there are large fluctuations in overseas markets.
This article is from the report "Economic Data Commentary: Positive Factors Increase, Continue to Rise and Improve" released by Huafu Securities Research Institute on May 17, 2024.
Analyst:
燕翔， S0210523050003
许茹纯， S0210523060005
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