China's gross domestic product grew five percent in 2025, meeting the annual target, official data showed on Monday, hitting 140 trillion yuan as the world's second-largest economy maintained its resilience during the year despite external and internal challenges.

It was helped by smaller-than-expected US tariff hikes and exporters' efforts to diversify away from the United States, allowing policymakers to keep stimulus to modest levels.

China's mighty manufacturing machine provided the much-needed economic lift.

The nation last week reported a record trade surplus of nearly US$1.2 trillion for the year, driven by booming exports to non-US markets as producers diversified to offset tariff pressure from Washington.

The economy grew 4.5 percent in the fourth quarter from a year earlier, with analysts having forecast 4.4 percent growth.

Still, that was slower than the 4.8 percent growth recorded in the third quarter.

Retail sales of consumer goods, a major indicator of the country's consumption strength, climbed 3.7 percent for the year, with turnover hitting 50.12 trillion yuan, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).

In December, retail sales rose 0.9 percent year on year.

Value-added industrial output, used to measure the activity of large enterprises, each with an annual main business turnover of at least 20 million yuan, expanded 5.9 percent while the figure for December alone rose by 5.2 percent year on year.

A breakdown of the value-added output data showed increases by sector for the year came in at 5.6 percent for mining, 6.4 percent for manufacturing and 2.3 percent for electricity, heat, gas, and water production and supply.

Value-added service output went up by 5.4 percent in 2025.

The value-added output growth by sector was 11.1 percent for information transmission, software and IT service and 10.3 percent for leasing and business services.

The index gauging the country's service industry output rose five percent year on year in December, NBS head Kang Yi said.

Fixed-asset investment went down 3.8 percent, with inflows reaching 48.5 trillion yuan, a decrease mainly driven by weak real estate investment.

Excluding the property sector, fixed-asset investment decreased 0.5 percent year on year in 2025, with inflows by sector decreasing 2.2 percent for infrastructure and 17.2 percent for real estate development and rising 0.6 percent for manufacturing.

Specifically, investment rose 2.3 percent in the primary industry, 2.5 percent in the secondary industry and fell 7.4 percent in the tertiary industry.

Among high-tech industries, investment grew 28.4 percent in information services and 16.9 percent in aerospace vehicle and equipment manufacturing.

In December, investment in fixed assets declined 1.13 percent month on month.

Per capita disposable income went up five percent in nominal terms to hit 43,377 yuan last year.

Median per capita disposable income nationwide was 36,231 yuan, a nominal increase of 4.4 percent year on year.

The income growth of rural residents outpaced that of urban residents, with per capita disposable income up 5.8 percent in rural areas and 4.3 percent in urban areas in nominal terms.

The surveyed urban unemployment rate in China stood at 5.2 percent. (Xinhua/Reuters)