China's economy struggles. Data points to slowing growth

China's economy is showing signs of slowing, according to the National Bureau of Statistics of China, property investment is down 10.2% year-over-year, with new home sales down 26% in that same period. In addition, new bank loans in China hit a 15-year low in July.

Yahoo Finance senior reporter Akiko Fujita joins Catalysts to give insight into China's overall economic health and national officials' attempts into stimulating the economy.

For more expert insight and the latest market action, click here to watch this full episode of Catalysts.

This post was written by Nicholas Jacobino

Video Transcript

China still struggling despite recent efforts from the government to boost consumer spending.

New data including new bank loans in July hitting a 15 year low that has critics calling for more economic stimulus in the world's second largest economy.

Here with more.

We got Yahoo finances Hi there.

Many.

So much of the data is being watched closely because what you mentioned it is the world's second largest economy.

What happens in China trickles out to so much of the global economy and the latest tranche of data that we got this morning pointing to continued struggles for China.

Let's take a look at some of those numbers.

Fixed asset investment slowing, posting growth of 3.6% year on year.

But it was the slow down in the property sector that was especially pronounced.

And, as you know, this has been the continued continued pain point for the Chinese economy.

Property investment fell 10.2% with the decline in home prices accelerating.

That was down more than 5% in major cities compared to the same period a year ago, and the new home sales that number right there, down nearly 26% in July year.

On year, you take a look at industrial output that expanded 5% in July, but that was still slower than the this month.

And then unemployment in major cities ticked higher to 5.2% the one rare bright spot here coming through from consumers.

Retail sales were up 2.7% in July, year on year.

That did come in higher than expected.

All combined the data points to continue challenges for the Chinese economy in a year where Chinese officials have cited 5% growth as the key goal, and there are increasing concerns that not likely to be reached, at least on paper.

Now the P, BC and Chinese officials have pushed to stimulate the economy, although not on the scale that some think that needs to be done.

Most recently, they introduced a rescue package.

This was providing up to $42 billion in funding to Chinese banks to spur lending.

But The Wall Street Journal reports banks have only fulfilled about 4% of that quota and not a lot of take up on the from.

The BBC cut its key interest rate last month to push spending on services.

But that has done little to improve consumer consumer confidence.

And the reality is here that Chinese officials simply don't have the appetite to go for this bazooka style stimulus, especially given the country's debt picture, something we've talked about for some time.

The debt to GDP ratio for the Chinese economy now well over 250%.

And Chinese officials in recent meetings have sort of signal that the new focus on consumer spending, particularly because that makes up about 50% of the Chinese economy for so look out for some additional stimulus, potentially on that front.

But don't expect the kind of stimulus that we have seen in the past Chinese officials simply not going there at least just yet.

All right, Akiko, thanks so much for bringing that down for us, certainly something that we will continue to watch