The Chinese manufacturing fireball slows down. In October, the Beijing PMI dropped to 50,4 points from 51,2 the previous month. It's about the minimum value since February 2009. This was announced by the Chinese Federation of Purchasing Logistics (Cflp), an organization close to the government.
"October's PMI decline points to a further economic slowdown in the future," Zhang Liqun, a researcher at the Development Research Center of the State Council, wrote in the CFLP release. The slowdown in manufacturing activity, which at this point remains just 0,4 points above the threshold marking the development from the recession, was completely unexpected. Analysts were even expecting an acceleration to 51,7 points.
The data is nonetheless discordant with that calculated by HSBC, which last week spoke of a PMI index for China recovering from 49,9 to 51 points. The difference is linked to the fact that while the official PMI gathers opinions above all from the country's largest manufacturing companies, the HSBS index is focused on small and medium-sized enterprises, which represent around 75% of the workforce.
