China's retail sales down 1.5 pct in January-May

China's retail sales of consumer goods went down 1.5 percent year on year in the first five months of this year, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) said Wednesday.

The country's retail sales of consumer goods amounted to 17.17 trillion yuan (about 2.54 trillion U.S. dollars) during the period, data from the NBS showed.

In May alone, retail sales decreased 6.7 percent from a year ago to 3.35 trillion yuan.