| Official: China's trade surplus won't slow |
BEIJING, Oct. 9 -- China's foreign trade will maintain its big surplus in the second half of the year while the nation continues to face inflationary pressure due to excess liquidity, the foreign-exchange regulator said over the weekend.
The country's current-account surplus amounted to 91.6 billion U.S. dollars in the six months ended on June 30, up from 67.3 billion dollars in the year-earlier period, the State Administration of Foreign Exchange said in a website statement.
The jump was propelled mainly by a 80 billion dollars surplus in China's trade in goods, up 47 percent on a yearly basis, the agency said. Trade in services registered a deficit of 5.7 billion dollars, up 44 percent, as a surplus in the tourism sector fell 26 percent, it said.
"We expect our current account, especially trade in goods, to maintain a relatively big surplus in the second half," the SAFE said in a separate report on China's half-year balance of payments.
China's economy grew 11.3 percent in the second quarter, the fastest in more than a decade, buoyed by mounting exports and investments. Economists worry the situation may result in inflation and a sudden slowdown.
The growth may ease to 10.5 percent for the entire 2006 after China twice raised benchmark interest rates and ordered commercial lenders to curb credit to red-hot sectors, the central bank said last week.
"We still foresee steady and relatively fast growth," the SAFE said in the report. "Domestic consumption is expected to sustain its strong momentum while the rise in investments will ease and lending will be reined in."
Spending on fixed assets such as property, factories and roads added 21.5 percent in August from a year earlier after jumping 27.4 percent in July, the nation's statistics bureau said last month.
"Concerning the abundant money supply, we believe potential pressure on inflation still exists," the SAFE said.
Banks on China extended a combined 2.54 trillion yuan (322 billion U.S. dollars) in new loans in the January-August period on the mainland, exceeding the government target of 2.5 trillion yuan (316 billion dollars) for the whole year.
Consumer prices, an inflation barometer, may grow by 1.5 percent this year, compared with a 1.2 percent climb in the first eights months, the central bank said.
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