The profits of China's major industrial firms dropped 2 percent year on year in August, data from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) showed Friday.
The decline came after a 2.6 percent rise in July.
The decrease in August mainly resulted from the slowing growth in industrial production and sales, the expanding decline in the prices of industrial products, and other adverse factors like typhoons, said NBS senior statistician Zhu Hong.
In the first eight months, the profits of China's major industrial firms dropped 1.7 percent to 4.02 trillion yuan (567.28 billion U.S. dollars) and the decrease rate was the same as that in the first seven months.
Specifically, profits of state-owned industrial firms dropped 8.6 percent from one year earlier to 1.21 trillion yuan, while those of private ones gained 6.5 percent to 1.13 trillion yuan year on year in the first eight months.
During the period, profits of the mining industry climbed 2.1 percent to 380.74 billion yuan, while the manufacturing industry dropped 3.2 percent to 3.3 trillion yuan.
Profits at 28 of the 41 industrial sectors surveyed rose compared with one year earlier, while 13 sectors saw their profits fall in the first eight months, according to the NBS.
The revenue of the major industrial firms, with annual revenue of more than 20 million yuan, amounted to 68.39 trillion yuan, up 4.7 percent year on year and their business costs climbed 5 percent to 57.71 trillion yuan during the period.
As for the trends in the industrial profits in the first eight months, the profit growth in major industries such as automobiles, electronics and non-ferrous metals has improved in the first eight months, Zhu said.
From January to August, the profit of automobile and electronic industry dropped 19 percent and 2.7 percent, but the decline rate was 4.2 percentage points and 3.6 percentage points less than that of the first seven months respectively.
Profits in the nonferrous metals sector rose 9.7 percent year-on-year in the first eight months, and the growth rate was 3.7 percentage points higher than that of the first seven months.
Private and small business profits continued to grow, Zhu said.
Profits of private businesses rose 6.5 percent year on year and profits of small businesses climbed 10.3 percent year on year in the first eight months.
The asset-liability ratio has declined, according to Zhu.
The asset-liability ratio of the major industrial firms was 56.8 percent at the end of August, down 0.5 percentage points from the same period last year. Among them, the ratio of the state-holding enterprises fell 0.9 percentage points year on year to 58.4 percent.
