China growth slumps to 30-year low – The Wall Street Journal

DUBLIN – Most countries would be delighted with an almost 7% GDP growth rate. But in China, addicted to a scorching rate of economic growth, that looks a lot like a disaster. World stock markets took a hit on Monday – especially in emerging markets – when China announced its slowest growth rate since 1990: 6.6%. The slowing growth comes against the backdrop of ongoing trade tensions with the US and various other issues within China, including some disruptions in debt markets. As China tries to make a smooth transition from a middle-income, manufacturing economy into a high-income, services and consumption-based economy, it faces a number of challenges. These range from smoothing the political feathers ruffled by China's rise to dealing with the growing environmental fallout of its dirty manufacturing practices. Should China fail to make the transition, it could be profoundly destabilizing for a world that has become increasingly reliant on a healthy, growing, and globally integrated China. The slump in markets on Monday underlined the key theme for 2019 so far – caution in the face of rising uncertainty and increasing global disruption of the status quo. – Felicity Duncan

China's Annual Economic Growth Rate Is Slowest Since 1990

By Lingling Wei

(The Wall Street Journal) BEIJING—China's economic expansion languished to its slowest pace in nearly three decades last year, as a bruising trade fight with the U.S. exacerbated weakness in the world's second-largest economy.

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