Zhu Hong, Senior Statistician of the Industry Department of the National Bureau of Statistics, Interprets the Profit Data of Industrial Enterprises from January to February 2019

_The financial data of industrial enterprises released by the National Bureau of Statistics on March 27 show that in January-February 2019, the total profits of Industrial Enterprises above the national scale decreased by 14.0% compared with the same period last year. After calculating, excluding the factors of Spring Festival, the total profit of Industrial Enterprises above the scale is flat and slightly lower than that of the same period last year.

1. The profits of consumer goods manufacturing and major equipment manufacturing industries have maintained relatively rapid growth.

From January to February, the profit of the consumer goods manufacturing industry above the scale increased by 5.8% year-on-year. Among them, the profit of the beverage and refined tea manufacturing industry increased by 23.3%, the tobacco products industry by 18.2%, the food manufacturing industry by 11.2%, the textile and apparel industry by 7.6%, and the pharmaceutical manufacturing industry by 4.2%.

From January to February, the profit of special equipment manufacturing industry increased 14.0%, electrical machinery and equipment manufacturing industry increased 10.9%, and metal products industry increased 8.8%.

From January to February, the profits of small industrial enterprises above the scale increased by 1.1% year on year.

2. Asset-liability ratio continues to decline

At the end of February, the ratio of assets and liabilities of Industrial Enterprises above scale was 56.9%, which was 0.2 percentage points lower than that of the previous year. Among them, the assets-liabilities ratio of state-owned holding enterprises is 58.6%, which is 1.0 percentage points lower than that of the previous year. The effect of deleveraging of state-owned enterprises is obvious.

3. The Main Reasons for the Decline of Industrial Profits

_Some key industries profit decline and the Spring Festival holidays are the main factors affecting the decline of industrial profits.

Firstly, the profits of major industries such as automobile, petroleum processing, steel and chemical industry have declined significantly. From January to February, the ex-factory prices of industrial products in the automotive industry fell by 0.4%, the petroleum processing industry by 1.3%, the steel industry by 2.5%, and the chemical industry by 2.3%. Affected by the decline in industrial prices, the profits of the automobile industry decreased by 37.07 billion yuan, the petroleum processing industry by 31.73 billion yuan, the steel industry by 29.06 billion yuan and the chemical industry by 18.88 billion yuan. After calculating, after deducting the above four industries, the profits of industries above scale increased by 0.2% year on year.

_____ Compared with last year - February, this Spring Festival holiday has a longer period of influence on the production and operation of industrial enterprises, objectively affecting the production and operation of enterprises.

In addition, the growth rate of industrial production and sales has slowed down slightly, which also affects the profit growth of enterprises to a certain extent.