China’s economic growth rate slowed to 6.9% in 2015, a 25-year-low for the world’s second largest economy. The country’s economy grew at 6.8% in the last quarter of 2015, and at 6.9% in the whole year, which was just lower than the government’s target of around 7%. Secondary industry growth dropped to 6% from 2014’s 7.3%.
To counter a further slowdown, China had earlier announces a series of measures including cutting interest rates and its central bank’s reserve requirement ratio. Analysts predict that more such measures will be taken to tackle the low growth rate.
China had experienced double digit growth for over a decade, and replaced Japan as the world’s second largest economy, making the task of easing investors’ worries harder. Beijing’s recent measures to handle its economic slowdown did not help either – stocks plunged to a 13-month low despite an economic rescue package, and the central bank moved to rescue the yuan only after allowing it to drop drastically.
But, Hong Kong-based analyst at Nomura Holdings, Gordon Kwan, told The Guardian that China’s GDP growth is not collapsing, and that its economy was “in decent shape, despite the recent hype about how it is on the verge of collapse”.
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