Home China: A historic contraction in Q1 – Standard Chartered
FXStreet News

China: A historic contraction in Q1 – Standard Chartered

China’s economy contracted for the first time in over four decades due to the coronavirus-inflicted slowdown, per Standard Chartered Bank. USD/CNY is trading at 7.072.

Key quotes

“GDP contracted 6.8% y/y in Q1 versus growth of 6% in Q4 (Figure 1). However, economic activity improved in March, with the decline in industrial production narrowing to 1.1% y/y from 13.5% y/y in January-February.”

“We now expect quarterly GDP growth of 3.0% y/y in Q2-2020 (4% prior), 6.0% in Q3 (5%), and 6.1% in Q4 (5.5%). Our growth forecast for 2020 remains unchanged at 2.5%.”

“We upgrade our 2021 GDP growth forecast to 7.5% from 5.8% prior, as we estimate growth of 18% y/y in Q1-2021 due to favourable base effects.”

“We maintain our expectation for another 80bps of cuts in the reserve requirement ratio (RRR) in Q2-Q3, a 25bps cut to the benchmark deposit rate in Q2, and another 10bps cut in the medium-term lending facility (MLF) rate in Q3.”

FX Street

FX Street

FXStreet is the leading independent portal dedicated to the Foreign Exchange (Forex) market. It was launched in 2000 and the portal has always been proud of their unyielding commitment to provide objective and unbiased information, to enable their users to take better and more confident decisions.