The National Bureau of Statistics released data on the national economy in July, some of which dropped from the previous month. Experts: The overall stable trend continues

July economic data is released and the real estate market has cooled significantly

On August 14, the National Bureau of Statistics announced the national economic performance data for July, and some data showed a certain degree of decline compared with the previous month. Among them, from January to July this year, the national real estate development investment was 7.2843 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 10.6%, and the growth rate was 0.3 percentage points lower than that from January to June.

Zhang Dawei, chief analyst of Centaline Real Estate, believes that the latest data shows that the real estate market has clearly cooled down under the principle of not using real estate as a tool to stimulate the economy in the short term. Whether it is investment data or sales data, under the influence of tightening control, the market has slowed down again, and judging from the trend, it is expected to continue in August.

In addition, the year-on-year growth rate of total retail sales of consumer goods and national fixed asset investment also declined. However, experts said that the fallback was within expectations and was not sustainable, so it is not advisable to pay too much attention to single-month data fluctuations. Overall, the national economy continued to operate within a reasonable range in July and continued its overall stable development trend.

Highlight 1 Real Estate

Intensive regulation, many real estate indicators fell

A reporter from the Beijing News combed through the data in recent months and found that many indicators such as real estate development investment, commercial housing sales area, and funds in place for real estate development companies have continued to decline or their growth rates have dropped. Among them, real estate development investment has experienced a decline in growth for three consecutive months from May to July. Statistics show that from January to May, the national real estate development investment increased by 11.2% year-on-year, and the growth rate dropped by 0.3 percentage points from January to June.

In addition, since the beginning of this year, the sales area of commercial housing has declined for six consecutive months. Among them, from January to May, January to June and January to July, the year-on-year decreases in the sales area of commercial housing reached 1.6%, 1.8% and 1.3% respectively, while the annual growth in 2018 was 1.3%.

Zhang Dawei analyzed that the main reasons for the year-on-year downward revision include the intensive release of continuously tightening regulatory policies, the rise in housing prices in some areas, and the reduction of cost-effective housing. In this regard, Yan Yuejin, research director of the E-House Research Institute Think Tank Center, said that the continued decline in commercial housing sales area indicates that the market has cooled down. However, he also pointed out that it is necessary to see that the decline has not actually expanded. This may be due to two reasons. The first is the expectation of tightening credit policies, which often causes some home buyers to accelerate home purchases and online signing in the near future. The second is that some real estate companies often accelerate launches and sales during the off-season in July due to their expectations for future regulation.

Since the beginning of this year, the real estate market has been intensively regulated. Statistics from the Centaline Real Estate Research Center show that in July, the number of national real estate regulatory policies was 56. From January to July 2019, the national real estate regulatory policies reached 307 times. Recently, Hainan, Suzhou, Shanghai and other places have issued measures related to real estate regulation. On the evening of July 24, Suzhou New regulations have been issued to tighten the real estate sales and purchase restrictions. This time, the "purchase restrictions" and "sales restrictions" have been upgraded. The strictness of the control policy has been unprecedented. According to the regulations, the social security or personal tax payment period required for non-Suzhou registered residents to purchase a house in Suzhou has been increased from one year to two years; in terms of sales restrictions, the scope has been further expanded, extending from the entire Suzhou Industrial Park to Suzhou City.

This is the fourth time in the past three months that Suzhou has stepped up real estate regulation. In May alone, Suzhou introduced three major regulation policies. The reporter noticed that behind the regulation is the continued rise in housing prices in the city this year. According to data from Lianjia’s official website, in June this year, the average listing price and reference average price of houses in Suzhou were 28,211 yuan/square meter and 26,985 yuan/square meter respectively, up 12.87% and 4% respectively from the end of last year. The average price of second-hand houses in the hot area, the industrial park, has exceeded 40,000 yuan/square meter.

Financing has cooled, and the growth rate of funds in place for real estate companies has declined

It is worth noting that the growth rate of real estate development companies’ funds in place has also declined in the past three months. From January to July, the funds in place for real estate development enterprises increased by 7.0% year-on-year, and the growth rate dropped 0.2 percentage points from January to June. The previous growth rate fell by 1.3 percentage points and 0.4 percentage points from January to May and January to June respectively.

In fact, in the past three months, many departments have intensively spoken out against real estate. Among them, on May 17, the China Banking and Insurance Regulatory Commission reiterated the strict supervision of real estate financing in Document No. 23. Nearly two months later, the National Development and Reform Commission issued a document requiring real estate companies to issue foreign debts only to replace medium- and long-term overseas debts due within the next year. On July 30, the Political Bureau meeting of the CPC Central Committee once again emphasized "housing is for living, not for speculation" after April, and for the first time made it clear that real estate will not be used as a short-term means of stimulating the economy.

Therefore, not only housing companies have tightened financing recently, but also on the personal housing loan side, financing continues to tighten, specifically reflected in the housing loan interest raterise, remain high, or the pace of lending slows down, etc. Monitoring data from Rong360 Big Data Research Institute shows that in July 2019, the national average interest rate for first-home loans was 5.44%, equivalent to 1.110 times the benchmark interest rate; the average interest rate for second-home loans was 5.76%.

Judging from the data, the national mortgage interest rate level has entered a rebound stage in the second half of the year. Among first-tier cities, mortgage interest rates in Shanghai and Shenzhen have declined month-on-month, while Beijing and Guangzhou have remained the same as last month; among second-tier cities, most cities have raised mortgage interest rates. Suzhou, Hangzhou, Ningbo, Dalian, and Changsha have raised their mortgage rates many times recently, and some banks have tight quotas and even suspended the acceptance of mortgage business.

In early August, reporters from the Beijing News learned through telephone consultation with business departments or personal loan staff of several banks that in the first half of this year, the interest rates for first home loans in Hangzhou generally increased by 5%-8% from the benchmark interest rate. At present, many banks have adjusted mortgage interest rates to 8% or 10% above the benchmark interest rate, and some banks have even adjusted to 15% above the benchmark interest rate. In the popular city of Suzhou, the mortgage interest rates of many banks are still above the benchmark interest rate by 22%.

Highlight 2 Consumption

The decline in car sales has led to a decline in consumption growth

In July, the total retail sales of consumer goods increased by 7.6% in nominal terms year-on-year, down 2.2 percentage points. Liu Aihua, spokesperson of the National Bureau of Statistics, said that the main reason for the decline in consumption growth was the change in automobile sales. In June, the National V and National VI emission standards were transferred Instead, car manufacturers adopted promotional activities, which boosted car sales in June. Car sales increased by 17.2% year-on-year. In July, car sales fell by 2.6% due to a shift in consumption or a certain overdraft effect. Overall, consumption still maintained a relatively rapid growth.

Data shows that catering revenue and online retail sales maintain steady and rapid growth, and the growth rate of retail sales of consumer upgrade products continues to accelerate. Liu Aihua said that there is no doubt about my country’s potential in consumption, and the rapid growth of residents’ income also supports overall consumption. From the perspective of consumption environment, new models such as sinking markets and community e-commerce are gradually emerging, consumption facilities are becoming increasingly perfect, and the consumption environment is constantly improving. From the perspective of supply, the immediately launched package of measures to support the platform economy will promote the development of the platform economy, including "Internet + services" and "Internet + production", and will provide sufficient support for consumption from the industry and supply sides. Therefore, consumption has the foundation and conditions to maintain a steady and rapid growth trend.

Pan Xiangdong, chief economist of New Era Securities, said that the significant improvement in automobile retail sales in June was not sustainable, so the growth rate of automobile consumption in July fell as expected, resulting in greater consumption fluctuations in June and July. It is expected that future consumption will be stable in the short term with a decline, which is related to the lack of obvious upward trend in overall economic data and the decline in residents' income growth.

Wang Qing, chief macro analyst of Oriental Jincheng, predicts that after the short-term disturbance factors subside and the low base effect of the previous year gradually emerges, the drag effect of automobile sales on social retail sales in August will be reduced. In addition, the current consumption of necessities maintains a steady momentum. It is expected that the social retail sales growth rate in August is expected to rebound to more than 8.0%.

　Point 3 Investment

From January to July, the growth rate of national fixed asset investment (excluding rural households) dropped 0.1 percentage points from January to June. In terms of industries, manufacturing investment increased by 3.3%, 0.3 percentage points faster than from January to June, and accelerated slightly for three consecutive months. Pan Xiangdong said that the general trend of manufacturing investment growth in the second half of the year is downward, but it can be seen in the band There may be ups and downs. The decline in profit growth of upstream companies and the fall in external demand will be reflected in the lag in future manufacturing investment data. However, judging from leading indicators such as the growth rate of the output value of construction and installation projects, the growth rate of the value of completed factory buildings and warehouses in the construction industry, and the growth rate of export delivery values, the growth rate of manufacturing investment may rebound slightly in the third quarter.

In addition, infrastructure investment increased by 3.8%, down 0.3 percentage points from January to June. Pan Xiangdong believes that although local special bond issuance increased in July, credit and non-standard bonds were weak. At the same time, many places were affected by factors such as high temperatures and heavy rains in July, which may also have a certain impact on infrastructure. The advancement of old renovation and new infrastructure is conducive to promoting infrastructure investment, but this round of policies is more restrained than in the past. While implementing proactive fiscal policies, the hard constraints of strictly controlling local government implicit debts, resolutely curbing the increase in implicit debts, and resolutely not taking the road of disorderly borrowing for construction are still there. Risk prevention is the bottom line, and non-standard financing still restricts infrastructure investment.

Wang Qing mentioned that new regulations on special bonds were introduced on June 10, allowing special bond funds to be used as capital for some major projects and encouraging financial institutions to provide supporting financing. This will have a significant effect on accelerating infrastructure construction in the later period, and the boost level is expected to be around 3.5 percentage points. However, there will be a time lag in the implementation of the policy, which also means that there is still some room for rebound in the growth rate of infrastructure construction in the later period.

From the perspective of structural data, investment in high-tech industries is growing rapidly. In addition, investment in some weak areas is increasing. Investment in ecological protection and environmental management increased by 41%, and investment in education increased by 18.5%, both of which maintained rapid growth.

Wang Qing said that it is expected that infrastructure investment will be more likely to accelerate in the future, which will offset the impact of sluggish manufacturing investment, and the growth rate of fixed asset investment will rebound slightly in August. However, he also pointed out that combined with various factors, downward pressure on the economy may appear. It is expected that the counter-cyclical adjustment of macroeconomic policies will increase.

One picture to understand July economic data

Product sales continue to expand

In July, the total retail sales of consumer goods was 3,307.3 billion yuan, a year-on-year nominal increase of 7.6%, a drop of 2.2 percentage points.

Investment grows steadily

From January to July, the national fixed asset investment (excluding rural households) was 34.89 trillion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 5.7%, and the growth rate was 0.1 percentage points lower than that from January to June.

From January to July, 8.67 million new jobs were created in cities and towns across the country, completing 79% of the full-year plan. In July, the national urban surveyed unemployment rate was 5.3%.

Commercial housing sales area decreased

From January to July, the sales area of commercial housing was 887.83 million square meters, a year-on-year decrease of 1.3%, and the decline was 0.5 percentage points narrower than that from January to June.

style="margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 15px; padding: 0px; color: rgb(64, 64, 64); font-family: "PingFang SC", "Lantinghei SC", "Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, Arial, "Microsoft YaHei", 微软雅黑, STHeitiSC-Light, simsun, 宋体, "WenQuanYi Zen Hei", "WenQuanYi Micro Hei", sans-serif; font-size: 18px; white-space: normal; text-align: left;">In July, the national consumer price rose by 2.8% year-on-year, an increase of 0.1 percentage points higher than the previous month. (Pan Yichun Gu Zhijuan)