China's producer inflation hits four-year high as consumer price growth stays steady

China's producer prices rose at the fastest pace in more than four years amid global energy price increases, while the country's consumer price growth remained steady, according to the National Bureau of Statistics on Wednesday.

The producer price index, which measures factory-gate prices, rose 5 percent year-on-year in September, accelerating from a 3.8 percent increase in August, the NBS said on Wednesday. The latest reading marks its highest rate since June 2022, when the figure came in at 6.1 percent, according to the bureau's statistics.

Dong Lijuan, an NBS statistician, attributed the price increases to higher international crude oil and nonferrous metal prices, while increased coal stockpiling for winter heating and temporarily tight supplies in major mining areas drove up prices in coal mining, washing, and processing.

Meanwhile, the consumer price index, a main gauge of inflation, rose 0.9 percent year-on-year last month, up from 0.8 percent in August. Gasoline prices climbed 16.6 percent, contributing about 0.47 percentage points to CPI growth, the NBS said.

Food prices have helped anchor consumer prices, as pork and fresh vegetable prices fell 10 percent and 8.1 percent, respectively, together lowering the year-on-year CPI increase by about 0.33 percentage points, the bureau said.

Core CPI — which excludes food and energy prices and is seen as a better gauge of underlying supply-demand conditions — rose 1 percent, unchanged from August, the NBS said. Analysts said this suggested domestic demand continued to recover at a mild pace.

On a month-on-month basis, the CPI rose 0.2 percent, down from 0.4 percent in August, while the PPI rose 1.2 percent, an acceleration from 0.4 percent in August, the bureau added.