Industrial profits keep increasing

The profit streak of China's industrial sector continued in the last month of 2012, official figures showed Sunday, adding to signs that the world's second largest economy is on the mend.

Profits made by the country's major industrial enterprises rose by 17.3 percent in December from a year earlier to 895.2 billion yuan ($143.86 billion), the National Bureau of Statistics announced Sunday.

This marks the fourth month in a row of rising corporate earnings in the country, although the December reading moderated from November's 22.8 percent increase.

For the whole of 2012, the country's industrial profits totaled 5.56 trillion yuan, an increase of 5.3 percent over the previous year.

Growth in profits at State-owned enterprises and their holding enterprises also edged up in December, but stayed in negative territory for the year, while privately owned enterprises continued to report double-digit growth in earnings for the year.

"The December reading further shows the upward trend in industrial profit growth in the fourth quarter of last year," Tang Jianwei, a senior macroeconomist at Bank of Communications in Shanghai, told the Global Times Sunday.

China's economy grew by 7.9 percent in the fourth quarter of 2012, bringing an end to seven consecutive quarters of slowdown, the bureau said earlier in January.

Tang said that corporate earnings will continue to improve in 2013, driven by an expected rebound in demand both at home and abroad. He also forecast that this will help to boost overall investment in the manufacturing sector.