China recorded an 18.3% growth in its Gross Domestic Product for the first quarter of its financial year, AFP reported on Friday. In the January-March quarter, China’s economy grew at the fastest pace since 1992, when it started maintaining its quarterly records.
The numbers came on the back of a low base as China’s economy had slumped by 6.8% in the first three months of 2020, after the coronavirus pandemic hit the country. However, by the end of the last financial year, China emerged to be the only major economy to have recorded a positive growth in its GDP. The country had made up for all lost ground by the end of September, which marked the third quarter of the previous financial year.
The rebound has been led by strong industrial output and robust exports as the pandemic fueled demand for Chinese-made medical goods and electronic devices, according to Bloomberg. In the January-March quarter, the economy received a boost by stronger demand at home and abroad and continued government support for smaller firms, Reuters reported.
“China’s Q1 [first quarter] started good, especially in retail sales, which was behind the economic recovery,” Marco Sun, Chief financial markets analyst at MUFG Bank in Shanghai, told the news agency. “Going forward, the focus point would be how to continue the growth and manage the financial risk.”
Despite the record GDP growth rate, on sequential basis, it slowed down to 0.6% in January-March from a revised 3.2% in the previous quarter. In fact, the first quarter growth rate came at slightly lower levels than what most agencies and economists had predicted.
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