Mixed data from Asia’s two biggest economies and Australia’s two biggest export markets.
New home price growth in major Chinese cities slowed in May compared to May last year and April, while a surge in imports last month saw the Japanese trade account register a surprise deficit.
China’s National Statistics Bureau issued figures yesterday showing the cost of new housing across the country’s 70 major cities rose 10.4% from a year earlier. Reuters said that was the sixth straight month of slowing in growth from a peak of 12.6% in November.
And there was a noticeable slowing in the month on month performance with house prices growing a steady 0.7% in May, the same as the April growth from March.
In month-on-month terms, average prices rose in 56 out of 70 cities, compared to growth in 69 cities in April. Prices fell in 9 cities (up from 8 in April) and were unchanged in 5 (up from none).
Major urban centres such as Beijing and Shanghai saw growth inch turn down, according to the statistics bureau which produced figures showing a slight fall of 0.05% in May against the 0.1% rise in April.
In year-on-year terms price growth for most major cities slowed, but remained in double digits for all but Shenzhen (which fell 0.6%). Beijing saw new home prices up 14.6% year on year, but down from the 17.4% rate in April.
Figures published last Wednesday showed Chinese banks boosted home lending last moth, despite moves by the government to try and cool prices and demand.
Central bank data showed household loans, mostly mortgages, rose to 610.6 billion yuan in May from 571 billion yuan in April, accounting for 55% of total new loans last month, up from 52% in April.
Reuters pointed out that tougher regulations in big cities has seen investors looking more to smaller Chinese cities (where there are fewer restrictions) inland from the coast.
Reuters says that’s sales by value in smaller cities have risen 30% so far in 2017 compared to a year ago.
But economists say new tightening measures introduced since mid-March are now starting to cool the overall market, led by the big cities.
And this is starting to impact new real estate developments as construction starts almost halved in May from April, according to last week’s investment data.
According to Reuters property investment growth eased for the first time in three months in May, growing 7.2% from a year ago, compared to a rise of 9.6% in April.
The softening of investment came as sales growth for commercial housing marked a third consecutive month of slowing growth.
New housing purchased in the first five months of 2017 came to 548.2 billion square meters, for a year-on-year rise of 14.3%, 1.4 percentage points slower compared to the year ended April.
In value terms sales totalled nearly Rmb4.4 trillion ($US642 billion), up 18.6% from the same period in 2016 but 1.5 percentage points slower than April. Meanwhile figures out yesterday showed that while Japan’s exports rose 14.9% in May imports leapt 17.8%, producing the country’s first trade deficit since January.
That produced a trade deficit of ¥203.4bn ($US1.8 billion) for May, sharply lower than revised surplus of ¥481.1bn in April (previously ¥481.7bn and close to $US4 billion).
The 14.9% annal growth rate in May for exports was almost double the 7.5% in April and that was the fastest annual rate for two years. Japan’s trade account recorded a Y47.3 billion deficit in may of last year.
Reuters said exports to Asia rse an annual 16.8%, 23.9 to China and those to South Korea climbing 22.9%. Exports to North America were up nearly 13%.
The 17.8% annual rate for imports was up from the 15.1% rate in April.
Imports from Asia were up 14.4%, while those from North America jumped 11.3%.
Japan’s Ministry of Finance said exports of autos and steel rose in May.
