China's economy heading in the right direction

FENG XIUXIA/CHINA DAILY

It did, however, announce in April a minor stimulus aimed at more social housing construction and accelerating railway development.

George Magnus, senior independent economic adviser for UBS in London, says the recent data clearly shows a trend.

"I think there is little question that rebalancing is happening. It was always going to happen in my view. The only questions were how and how quickly," he says.

The economist, who was author of Uprising: Will Emerging Markets Shape or Shake the World Economy, which warned of the risks of an investment bust in China if rebalancing did not take place, points out that one of the indicators of rebalancing is a decline in property investment.

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Real estate investment was 4.2 trillion yuan ($677 billion) in the first six months, a 14.1 percent increase over the same period last year but down from increases of more than 19 percent that predominated throughout 2013.

"We can see the start of a protracted downswing in property and construction investment. This is of huge consequence as this sector has been the leading edge of China's expansion for over 10 years," he says.

Duncan Innes-Ker, regional editor for Asia at the Economist Intelligence Unit in London, says one explanation for the strong first half data suggesting rebalancing is the increased role consumption tends to play in the early part of the year.

"The first thing to remember is that consumption tends to be much stronger in the first quarter of the year in China, owing to the timing of the Chinese New Year, which means that you quite often see its contribution to GDP growth starting off strong and then easing through the rest of the year."

Innes-Ker, who was previously a senior China economist of the EIU in Beijing, senses, however, that this time there may be a more fundamental change taking place.

"There are good reasons to expect that consumption will play a more important role this year. The weakening of property investment is unlikely to be reversed anytime soon, and will play a big role in dampening investment's contribution to growth.

"The underlying outlook for consumer demand also remains very positive, with incomes rising at double-digit rates and fields such as e-commerce expanding at a phenomenal pace."

Mark Williams, chief Asia economist at Capital Economics, also in London, says interpreting the China rebalancing story often depends on whether you are an optimist or pessimist.