【英语中国】中国继续推进调控政策 经济或将放缓

Premier Wen Jiabao made clear that China will press ahead with economic policies that many analysts expect will lead to slower growth in coming months as the property market cools, an outcome that is unnerving global markets.

China will 'maintain the continuity and stability of economic policies, while making them more targeted and effective,' Mr. Wen said in a meeting with scholars and businesspeople, according to a State Council statement on Wednesday.

'China's economy is currently developing in the direction envisaged by the macroeconomic adjustment and control policies,' he said.

Those policies include a decision last month to loosen the currency's peg to the dollar -- fiercely opposed by Chinese exporters -- and restrictive policies on the housing market that have been crimping sales since being put in place in mid-April.

Mr. Wen emphasized the need to control inflation, a concern that has underpinned the government's recent push to roll back its economic stimulus.

His remarks appeared to signal the government is currently content with how its policies are playing out -- despite increasing worries about weaker growth from investors. The benchmark Shanghai Composite Index ended down 1.2% Wednesday, its sixth straight day of declines, after a 4.3% drop Tuesday.

China, having recovered early and strongly from the financial crisis, faces a very different set of problems than the slower-growing U.S., Europe or Japan. Although authorities are still focused on sustaining growth, they also are trying to make sure the enormous stimulus they have applied since late 2008 doesn't overheat the economy and cause longer-term problems.

Many economists expect China's growth to slow from its torrid 11.9% pace in the first quarter -- a rate widely seen as unsustainable and driven by stimulus policies -- to something closer to 9%. A more sustainable pace of growth and a calmer property market are important goals for policy makers, who are trying to contain popular discontent with surging housing prices, and ensure that a bursting real-estate bubble won't derail the country's recovery.

Those concerns will likely keep the government from changing course on its restrictive housing policy anytime soon.

In the short term, the crackdown on the property market is likely to mean China's growth will be slower than it would have been otherwise. With property sales down sharply in recent weeks, developers are earning less money and will have less incentive to build new properties. That will likely eventually translate into fewer construction jobs, and smaller imports of commodities from abroad.

Chinese authorities have already been scaling back new bank lending after last year's binge, and controlling the scale of new public-works investments by local governments.

And the Chinese currency, although it has risen only modestly against the dollar, is up sharply against the euro this year, which will likely weigh on the crucial export sector. Some investors may not be well prepared for the weaker economic data that are likely to begin trickling out of China in coming months.

'Investors do not seem to have been expecting much of a near-term sequential slowdown' in China, said Michael Buchanan, chief Asia economist for Goldman Sachs. But one is nonetheless coming. 'Much of the sequential slowdown is probably already happening even though it hasn't shown up broadly in the macro data yet,' he said in a report.

Although economic data for May, the most recent available, haven't shown much of a slowdown, some leading indicators are flashing red. On Monday, the New York-based Conference Board revised down its leading economic index for China after it discovered a mistake in the original calculation. The change got a lot of attention from investors, even though the revision didn't change the Conference Board's projection that Chinese growth is set to slow -- but not collapse -- in coming months.

'We're seeing a moderation of growth, and we're expecting business conditions to remain fairly strong in China for the rest of the year,' said Bill Adams, the Conference Board's resident economist in Beijing. 'This is what you would expect for a country coming out of this part of the business cycle.'

国务院总理温家宝明确表示，中国将继续推进经济调控政策，很多分析人士预计这些政策会导致未来数月经济随着楼市降温而减缓增长。中国经济增长放缓的可能性，已经引起全球市场的不安。

国务院周三发布的声明显示，温家宝在会见学术界和企业界人士时说，中国将“保持宏观经济政策连续性和稳定性，增强宏观调控的针对性、灵活性”。

Xinhua/ZUMA Press温家宝本周主持召开了经济形势座谈会他说，“当前我国经济正朝着宏观调控的预期方向发展”。

这些政策包括上个月让人民币对美元脱钩的决定（中国出口商强烈反对），以及4月中旬出台、以后一直压制着销售的房地产紧缩政策。

温家宝强调了控制通货膨胀的必要性。中国政府正是出于对通胀的担忧，才于近期展开了撤回经济刺激措施的行动。

温家宝的言论似乎暗示，目前政府对政策的实施效果还是满意的。只是投资者越来越担心经济增长变得疲弱。周三，上证综合指数继周二下跌4.3%后收跌1.2%，连续六个交易日走低。

中国已经及时、强劲地摆脱了金融危机，与增长更慢的美国、欧洲和日本比起来，它面临的是一系列截然不同的问题。尽管当局仍然注重于经济的持续增长，他们同样也力图保证2008年年底以来实施的大规模刺激措施不至于导致经济过热、造成更长远的问题。

很多经济学家预计，中国经济在经历一季度11.9%的高增长后将会慢下来，达到更接近于9%的水平。人们普遍认为，一季度的增速不可持续，并且是由刺激政策推动的。更可持续的增长速度和更稳定的房地产市场，都是政策制定者的重要目标。他们在努力控制大众对房价飙升的不满，同时保证中国的经济复苏不会因为房地产泡沫的破灭而前功尽弃。

这些担忧很可能令政府不会很快改变紧缩的楼市政策。

短期内，打压楼市很可能意味着中国的增长将比不出台紧缩政策要慢。由于最近几周房屋销量剧减，开发商盈利减少，建造新屋的动力将会减弱。这可能最终造成建筑工作减少，从海外进口的大宗商品减少。

在去年的放贷潮之后，中国有关部门已经在缩减新增银行贷款，并在控制地方政府新建公共工程的投资规模。

尽管人民币兑美元只是小幅升值，今年兑欧元却大幅走强，这很可能会对重要的出口业造成重压。未来几个月中国很可能会陆续出炉疲弱的经济数据，这可能会出乎一些投资者的意料。

高盛(Goldman Sachs)首席亚洲经济学家布坎南(Michael Buchanan)说，投资者看来预计中国近期内不会出现明显的连续放缓。不过，一场连续的放缓却即将到来。他在一份报告中说，连续的放缓也许已经开始发生，即使尚未在宏观数据中广泛地体现出来。

尽管5月份经济数据（可以获得的最新数据）尚未显示出明显的放缓，一些领先指标却亮起了红灯。周一，在位于纽约的世界大型企业联合会(Conference Board)发现最初的计算中存在错误之后，下调了中国主要经济指标。此举获得了投资者的普遍关注，即使数据的修改并没有改变世界大型企业联合会的预期：未来几个月，中国增长将会放缓，但不会崩溃。

世界大型企业联合会常驻北京经济学家亚当斯(Bill Adams)说，我们将看到增长放缓，我们预计今年剩余时间里，中国的商业形势将保持还算强劲的水平；这是一个逐步从商业周期的这个阶段走出来的国家预计会发生的情况。