CX Briefing: Consumer Inflation Levels Off

A rundown of the news making headlines in and around China:

CPI levels off: China’s consumer prices leveled off in July, after a slight rebound in June, as the consumer price index (CPI) remained flat year-on-year. Dong Lijuan, a statistician at the National Bureau of Statistics, pinned this on lower food prices, with drops in fruit, vegetable and pork prices exacerbated by high bases a year earlier. Year-on-year growth in the core CPI, which strips out volatile food and energy prices, accelerated 0.1 percentage points from June to 0.8%. Meanwhile, the year-on-year decline in the producer price index (PPI), which measures factory-gate prices, remained unchanged at 3.6%. The government’s campaign against excessive competition, termed “involution,” led to marginal improvements in prices in some industrial sectors.