CHINA CUTS GDP GROWTH

Beijing

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China yesterday lowered last year’s growth figure, already the weakest in a quarter-century, days after worries about slowing expansion in the world’s second-largest economy caused global stock market havoc. Officials acknowledged that China’s own stock exchanges had seen “bubbles”, after a spectacular debt-fuelled rally was followed by a painful bust which huge interventions have failed to reverse, but said the turbulence was coming to an end. The National Bureau of Statistics said that after a “preliminary confirmation” it reduced the 2014 gross domestic product (GDP) growth figure to 7.3 per cent from the 7.4pc announced in January. A final confirmation could come in January 2016, it added. The new number remains the lowest since 1990, when expansion plummeted to 3.9pc. After decades of double-digit expansion, authorities are attempting a tricky rebalancing -- from an investment- and export-led economic model to one where domestic consumer demand drives slower but more sustainable growth. Finance minister Lou Jiwei told a G20 meeting of finance ministers and central bank governors in Ankara at the weekend that the economy had entered a “new normal”. Growth was expected to remain at “around seven percent” -- the government’s 2015 target -- he said, adding: “The situation may sustain for four to five years.” Chinese growth slowed from last year in the first two quarters of 2015, reaching 7.0pc in both periods. Nomura International analyst Wendy Chen said yesterday’s GDP correction was largely related to service sectors, which were key to the overall transition but had lower growth than earlier figures showed. “This means China’s economic structure did not improve as was expected”, she said. The National Development and Reform Commission, China’s top economic planning agency, played down growth concerns yesterday, saying electricity consumption and railway cargo transport improved in August. Property prices and transaction volumes also rose, it said in a statement, predicting the economy would be “able to achieve the full-year expansion target”.