China sees exports increase 2% in June, imports decline

China's export rose by 2.1 percent year-on-year to 1.17 trillion yuan($188.5 billion) in June, a better-than-expected increase after the 6.4 percent decline in April, according to data from Customs released on Monday.

However, the import figure fell by by 6.7 percent to 890.67 billion yuan last month, leading to an accelerated growth of monthly trade surplus to 45 percent year-on-year.

In the first six months, the country's total foreign trade value was 11.53 trillion yuan, down by 6.9 percent from a year earlier. Exports increased by 0.9 percent to 6.57 trillion yuan while imports decreased by 15.5 percent to 4.96 trillion yuan.

Trade surplus in the first half rose by 1.5 times from a year earlier to 1.61 trillion yuan, the data revealed.

The structure of trade modes continued to improve when exports of general trade showed marked growth, and strong momentum was spotted in exports to emerging markets and some countries along the "Belt and Road", said Huang Songping, a spokesman from the Customs department, at a press conference.

China's bilateral trade with the European Union declined by 6.8 percent during the January-to-June period to 1.67 trillion yuan and trade with Japan fell by 10.6 percent to 832.02 billion yuan, said Hong.

"The Greek debt crisis is likely to influence China's export, but it is difficult to predict the exact effects," added Huang.

Agreement finanlly reached with Greece: EU's Tusk

"After 17 hours we have finally reached it, we will continue to support Greece ," Donald Tusk, the president of the European Council said to the press Monday morning after Eurozone leaders' "last try" for Greece to avert bankruptcy and exit from the European common currency zone.

New rules allow easier access to interbank bond trading

China has issued new rules making it easier for foreign central banks, sovereign wealth funds and global financial organizations to access its interbank bond market, the latest step in the opening up of Asia's largest economy.

They will no longer need pre-approval to trade bonds, interest-rate swaps and conduct repurchase agreements, and can do so after filing a registration form, the People's Bank of China said in a statement posted on its website on Tuesday.

The change comes as China seeks to promote global use of the yuan to support its case for inclusion in the International Monetary Fund's basket of reserve currencies.

Increased foreign participation will help boost demand for local bonds as issuance by regional authorities surges.

"This is the most critical step in the yuan's internationalization," said Huang Wentao, an analyst at China Securities Co. "It will help further expand the interbank market and increase trading in the long run."

Local governments are set to issue 2.8 trillion yuan ($451 billion) of bonds this year. The nation is considering expanding a debt-swap program for provinces and cities, which seeks to convert high-cost existing debt maturing this year into low-yielding municipal bonds, according to industry sources. The existing 2 trillion yuan quota may be expanded to 3 trillion yuan, they said.

The opening of China's markets has the potential to boost global holdings of the nation's onshore bonds to as much as $500 billion in five years, according to JPMorgan Chase & Co estimates.

Money supply rises, but still below target

China's money supply growth was better than expected in June, but still below the annual growth target, official data showed Tuesday, pointing to further room for monetary easing ahead.

M2, a broad measure of money supply that covers cash in circulation and all deposits, grew by 11.8 percent year-on-year to 133.34 trillion yuan ($21.46 trillion) by the end of June, beating previous market forecasts, according to data released Tuesday by the People's Bank of China (PBC), the country's central bank.

The M2 growth figure was also 1 percentage point higher than at the end of May, but still below the 12 percent annual M2 growth target set by the central government.

"While M2 growth picked up pace compared with the previous month, the 11.8 percent figure still represents a relatively slow growth rate, because historically, China's average M2 growth has usually been around 13 to 14 percent," Xi Junyang, a professor at the Shanghai University of Finance and Economics, told the Global Times Tuesday.

"If the central bank announces some monetary easing measures, it won't be very hard to achieve the 12 percent annual target, but the PBC needs to adjust the liquidity level carefully based on the real economy," Xi noted.

Tuesday's data also showed that Chinese banks issued 6.56 trillion yuan worth of new yuan-denominated loans during the first half of this year, up 537.1 billion yuan compared with the same period in 2014.

Nevertheless, the country's total social financing aggregate - a broad gauge of liquidity in the economy including bank loans, corporate bonds and other equity financing - dropped 1.46 trillion yuan year-on-year to 8.81 trillion yuan during the first six months of 2015, according to the PBC data.

In terms of the social financing structure, bank loans continued to increase during the first half, meaning that financing through other channels such as corporate bonds decreased, which is probably because the central government has rolled out various measures to prevent and curb financial risks, Zhuang Jian, a senior economist with the Asian Development Bank in China, said Tuesday in an interview with financial TV channel China Business Network.

"Social financing is not completely controlled by the central bank, but decided by economic activities," Xi said. "Amid the current sluggish growth, economic activities are also quite slack at present, leading to the fall in social financing."

With the continuing downward pressure, enterprises have become more cautious toward business expansion, thus resulting in weakening demand for capital, Xi explained.

Against such a backdrop, experts and institutions widely expect more monetary easing policies to be rolled out to help stabilize the economic fundamentals.

"As there is no inflationary pressure on the macro economy, there is still room for further monetary easing," Xi said.

The PBC will not change its monetary easing stance in the second half of this year, but will make adequate adjustments to market liquidity by using various policy tools such as cuts to banks' reserve requirement ratio and new pledged supplementary lending (PSL), Minsheng Securities said in a research note Tuesday.

PSL is a monetary tool the central bank created in 2014 to extend loans to banks at low interest rates.

According to a research note Huatai Securities sent to the Global Times Tuesday, the central bank is likely to maintain its prudent monetary policy, and to fine-tune overall liquidity through various open market operations in the near future.

China posts 7% GDP growth rate in Q2

China's economic growth shows sign of stabilization, with the GDP posting a 7 percent growth rate in the second quarter, the National Bureau of Statistics said on Wednesday.

Economists said the stable growth momentum is underpinned by the slight rebound in industrial production. They expect the government to continue escalate policy supports in the coming months.

The service sector, or the tertiary industry, registered fast expansion in the first half, at a rate of 8.4 percent, compared with 7.9 percent in the first quarter, supported by buoyant stock market trading and recovering property sales.

It is higher than the growth rate of the industrial sector, or the secondary industry, that expanded by 6.1 percent.

Industrial output growth accelerated to 6.8 percent in June, up from 6.1 percent in May. The fixed-asset investment growth in the first six months slightly declined to 11.4 percent year-on-year from 13.5 percent in the first quarter, due to the contraction of real estate investment despite the government's supportive policy.

The growth of retail sales of consumer goods remained stable, at a rate of 10.4 percent from January to June, compared with 10.6 percent in the first quarter. More pragmatic policy measures may pave the way for the economic uptick in the third quarter, said Wang Tao, chief economist in China at the UBS AG.

To buttress domestic demand, the government has continued escalating policy supports during the past month, taking more pragmatic measures to speed up infrastructure construction investment projects, she said.

"The marginally loosened reins over local government activities and more policy efforts to improve monetary transmission may set the stage for the uptick since July in sequential growth," helping the year's GDP growth to meet the annual target, said Wang.

China's H1 industrial output up 6.3 pct

Despite a continued slowdown, China's industrial sectors may walk out of their worst period and provide a firm footing for stabilization of the economy, new data has suggested.

Industrial output grew 6.3 percent year on year in the first half of 2015, slightly down from a 6.4-percent increase in the first quarter, data released by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) showed on Wednesday.

In an encouraging sign, the growth rate has gradually recovered from 5.6 percent in March, the lowest level since the global financial crisis in 2008.

Surpassing market anticipation, China's industrial output climbed by 6.8 percent from a year ago for a third straight month of increases in June.

The manufacturing sector showed stellar performance by rising 7.7 percent in the last month. The mining industry rose 2.7 percent, and output for electricity, heating, gas and water was up 2.1 percent.

Industrial enterprises raked in combined profits of 2.25 trillion yuan (nearly 370 billion U.S. dollars) in the Jan.-May period, down 0.8 percent from a year earlier, the NBS said.

China uses industrial output, officially called industrial value added, to measure the activity of designated large enterprises with annual turnover of at least 20 million yuan.

NBS spokesperson Sheng Laiyun said during a press conference that the industrial structure has continued to improve and high-tech sectors maintained double-digit growth.

China's economy posted a better-than-expected 7 percent growth year on year in the second quarter of 2015, unchanged from the first quarter.

The NBS also released a string of other economic indicators including retail sales and investment on Wednesday

China's H1 fixed-asset investment up 11.4 pct

China's fixed-asset investment grew 11.4 percent year on year to 23.71 trillion yuan (3.88 trillion U.S. dollars) in the first half, official data showed on Wednesday.

The growth pace was flat from the figure for the first five months but was lower than the 13.5-percent growth registered in the first quarter, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) said in a statement.

"Investment growth rebounded in both May and June, bringing the pace for the first half to the same level as the January-May period. We can also say that the trend of declining investment has been basically curbed," NBS spokesperson Sheng Laiyun told a press conference.

In the first half, fixed-asset investment in the agricultural sector grew most rapidly, up 27.8 percent year on year, followed by 12.4 percent for the service sector and 9.3 percent for the industrial sector.

The calculation does not include fixed-asset investment by farmers. It includes projects with investment of at least 5 million yuan, as well as all property development projects.

China's GDP expanded by 7 percent in the second quarter, flat from the first quarter and offering another sign of a stabilizing economy, the NBS said.