China’s retail sales shrink far more than expected, while industrial production disappoints

Retail sales fell by 5.9% in November from a year ago, the National Bureau of Statistics said. That’s worse than expectations for a decline of 3.7%, according to analysts polled by Reuters. Food and medicine were the only sub-categories that saw sales growth in November. Fixed asset investment for the year through November slowed to 5.3% year-on-year growth, down from 5.8% growth in the first 10 months of the year. China has significantly peeled back a host of Covid-related restrictions that had hampered domestic travel and business activity in the last two weeks, including vaccinations for elderly people, and encouraged Covid patients to recover at home. The unemployment rate in cities ticked up to . . .