1. Chinese officials said they would stop reporting the country’s youth unemployment rate after months of spiraling increases, depriving investors, economists and businesses of another key data point on the declining health of the world’s second-largest economy. The surprise move extends China’s efforts to restrict access to a variety of data on its economy and corporate landscape to outside scrutiny. At the same time, China’s central bank unexpectedly cut a range of key interest rates, an emergency move to reignite growth after new data showed the economy slid deeper into distress last month. The twin moves earlier today by the National Bureau of Statistics and the People’s Bank of China came as a batch of new data showed spending growth by consumers and businesses slowed last month, while factory output grew much less than expected, adding to a recent raft of worrying signals. (Source: wsj.com)
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