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The first half report cards of major economic cities have all been released. Overall, the top ten cities in terms of GDP and their rankings are exactly the same as last year, but noteworthy changes are taking place internally, including differentiation in economic growth rates and imbalances in growth momentum.

According to data released by local statistical departments, the top ten cities in mainland China in terms of GDP in the first half of the year were: Shanghai, Beijing, Shenzhen, Chongqing, Guangzhou, Suzhou, Chengdu, Hangzhou, Wuhan and Nanjing.

In terms of economic growth rate, half of the top ten cities had actual GDP growth rates (year-on-year, the same below) higher than the national average (5.0%), namely Suzhou (6.2%), Chongqing (6.1%), Shenzhen (5.9%), Beijing (5.4%), and Wuhan (5.3%).

The First Financial Daily reporter calculated that among the top ten cities, eight had a nominal GDP growth rate higher than the national average (4.0%), and only two were lower than the national average. Shenzhen had the fastest nominal growth rate (6.2%), while other cities with growth rates exceeding 5% included Beijing (5.7%), Hangzhou (5.6%), Chongqing (5.5%), and Suzhou (5.3%). Nanjing, which had a nominal growth rate lower than the national average, had a growth rate of only 3.5%, and Guangzhou had a growth rate of only 1.2%.

As can be seen from the above, the actual and nominal GDP growth rates of Beijing, Shenzhen, Chongqing, Suzhou and Wuhan both outperformed the national average, while the actual and nominal growth rates of Guangzhou and Nanjing were both lower than the national average. At the same time, the actual GDP growth rates of six of the top ten cities were higher than the nominal growth rates.

Zheng Tiancheng, deputy director of the Enterprise and Market Research Center of the China (Shenzhen) Institute for Comprehensive Development, said in an interview with the First Financial reporter that the actual GDP growth rate of major cities is generally higher than the nominal growth rate. The next step is to solve the hidden dangers of deflation from a more macro perspective and encourage final consumption.

Shanghai, Beijing and Shenzhen continue to lead, while Chongqing remains in fourth place

Among the top ten cities, Shanghai, Beijing and Shenzhen continued to rank in the top three, with GDP reaching 2234.559 billion yuan, 2179.130 billion yuan and 1730.22 billion yuan respectively.

Among them, Beijing and Shenzhen's half-year GDP growth exceeded 100 billion yuan, reaching 117 billion yuan and 100.462 billion yuan respectively. Shanghai's growth this year has adjusted back to 95.542 billion yuan, compared with a high base of 204.086 billion yuan last year. Overall, Shanghai, Beijing and Shenzhen continue to lead the country in terms of GDP total and growth.

Chongqing's GDP in the first half of the year exceeded 1.5 trillion yuan for the first time, reaching 1,513.824 billion yuan, and its total economic output once again surpassed Guangzhou (1,429.766 billion yuan), firmly ranking fourth in the country. In the first half of this year, Chongqing's GDP increased by 79.229 billion yuan compared with the same period last year, while Guangzhou's increase in the same period was only 16.697 billion yuan, and the gap between the two further widened to more than 60 billion yuan. However, since Chongqing's total area is about 11 times that of Guangzhou, its economic density is obviously much lower than that of Guangzhou.

As a traditional industrial city, in the first half of this year, Guangzhou's industrial added value above designated size fell by 0.8% year-on-year, 6.8 percentage points lower than the national average, which had a serious impact on the overall economic growth. Among the three pillar industries, the automobile manufacturing industry continued to be under pressure, with a 16.4% drop in added value; the electronic products manufacturing industry and the petrochemical manufacturing industry grew by 8.1% and 4.0% respectively.

In addition, in the first half of the year, Guangzhou's fixed asset investment grew by 2.0%, 1.9 percentage points lower than the national average; the total retail sales of consumer goods reached 560.155 billion yuan, a year-on-year growth of zero, 3.7 percentage points lower than the national average; foreign trade exports reached 311.78 billion yuan, down 4.1%, 11 percentage points lower than the national average. The "three engines" driving economic growth have all stalled.

In contrast, Chongqing's industrial added value increased by 8.6% in the first half of the year, 2.6 percentage points higher than the national average. Among them, the output of new energy vehicles increased by 1.5 times year-on-year, driving Chongqing's automobile output back to the top of the national cities. The city's fixed asset investment increased by 2.6% year-on-year; the total retail sales of consumer goods reached 768.488 billion yuan, an increase of 3.9%; exports reached 235.88 billion yuan, an increase of 2.8%, all three data are better than Guangzhou.

Nanjing, another city with a lower growth rate among the top ten cities, has been further outpaced by Wuhan, which ranks ninth. In the first half of the year, Nanjing achieved a regional GDP of 860.742 billion yuan, 136.777 billion yuan less than Wuhan (997.519 billion yuan). At the same time, it is only 39.952 billion yuan more than Ningbo (820.79 billion yuan), which ranks 11th. Nanjing's position in the top ten is not stable. Wuhan is only 16.181 billion yuan away from Hangzhou (1013.7 billion yuan), which ranks eighth. It is not impossible for it to be in the ninth place and look forward to the eighth place.

Shenzhen and Jiangsu race, industry and foreign trade are powerful tools

As mentioned above, in the first half of the year, Shenzhen and Suzhou had the highest nominal and real growth rates among the top ten cities, respectively. A closer look at the performance of the two cities reveals that industry and foreign trade are the common growth "accelerators" of the two cities.

Shenzhen's industrial production grew rapidly in the first half of the year, with the city's industrial added value above designated size increasing by 12.0% year-on-year. Among the major industries, the added value of computer, communication and other electronic equipment manufacturing industries above designated size increased by 17.0%. The output of major high-tech products continued to grow rapidly, among which the output of 3D printing equipment, service robots and electronic components increased by 83.3%, 37.6% and 29.1% respectively.

A regional economic expert told the First Financial reporter that industry is the most important "basic plate" of Shenzhen's economy. In the first half of the year, despite various challenges such as an volatile external environment and increasing competitive pressure, Shenzhen's economy still maintained a relatively high growth rate that exceeded the national average. The stable industrial development situation played a vital role.

The stability of the "basic situation" directly strengthened investment confidence. In the first half of the year, Shenzhen's fixed asset investment increased by 8.9% year-on-year, 6 percentage points higher than the national average. Among them, industrial investment grew strongly, up 49.2%.

Since the beginning of this year, Shenzhen's foreign trade has continued to surge. After the total import and export volume in the first four months won the first place among mainland cities since 2015, the data in the first half of the year further consolidated this position, with a total import and export value of 2.2 trillion yuan, a record high for the same period in history, an increase of 31.7%. Among them, exports were 1.41 trillion yuan, an increase of 34.9%, also a record high for the same period in history; imports were 792.45 billion yuan, an increase of 26.5%.

Suzhou, the "strongest prefecture-level city", also has strong momentum, with its actual GDP growth rate in the first half of the year higher than the national average and Jiangsu Province by 1.2 and 0.4 percentage points respectively. Although Suzhou's total economic output ranked sixth in the country last year, its actual growth rate of 4.6% ranked third from the bottom among the 26 trillion-yuan GDP cities. This year, Suzhou has made a strong comeback, with its GDP growth rate in the first quarter ranking first among the 26 trillion-yuan GDP cities.

In the first half of the year, Suzhou maintained a good growth trend. The added value of industrial enterprises above designated size in the city increased by 9.5%. Among the 35 major industrial sectors, the growth rate of industrial output value reached 62.9%, an increase of 8.6 percentage points over the same period last year. Fixed asset investment reached 332.81 billion yuan, an increase of 5.0%, of which industrial investment reached 102.34 billion yuan, an increase of 12.9%. Consumption performance was particularly outstanding, with total retail sales of consumer goods reaching 500.29 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 7.4%, significantly exceeding the national average by 3.7 percentage points.

In terms of foreign trade, Suzhou achieved a total import and export volume of 1,231.69 billion yuan in the first half of the year, an increase of 9.2%. Among them, exports were 763.22 billion yuan, an increase of 9.9%; imports were 468.47 billion yuan, an increase of 7.9%. The exports of metal products, computer communication and electronic equipment manufacturing, and automobile manufacturing increased by 14.5%, 20.9%, and 44.4% respectively, which indirectly reflects that the local foreign trade structure adjustment has begun to show results.

The industrial sector played an obvious role in driving growth, while the service industry saw a correction

The industrial economy is the main body of my country's national economy and plays a core role in driving up GDP. The economic performance of the top ten cities in terms of GDP in the first half of the year is highly correlated with their industrial performance.

The actual and nominal GDP growth rates of Beijing, Shenzhen, Chongqing, Suzhou and Wuhan all outperformed the national average, thanks to the high growth rate of industry.

In this regard, Zheng Tiancheng believes that, in general, the current industrial economic development of major cities in my country is facing both positive and negative trends, namely, pressure on traditional industrial sectors and rapid development of new quality productivity industrial sectors. Taking Shenzhen, where the industry has the fastest growth rate, as an example, new and future industries are developing rapidly. In the first half of the year, the added value of Shenzhen's computer, communication and other electronic equipment manufacturing industries above designated size increased by 17.0%, and the output of 3D printing equipment, service robots, and electronic components increased by 83.3%, 37.6%, and 29.1%, respectively.

Guangzhou, a traditional manufacturing powerhouse, is facing difficulties in transformation. As Guangzhou's largest pillar industry, the automobile manufacturing industry continues to be under pressure, with the added value falling by 16.4%. Zheng Tiancheng believes that Guangzhou is expected to continue to be under pressure in this regard in the future, and urgently needs to achieve transformation and upgrading through greater efforts to develop new quality productivity.

In terms of the service industry, in the first half of the year, the growth rate of the service industry in the top ten cities in terms of GDP was generally lower than that of the same period last year. The fastest growth was in Chongqing and Shanghai, with a growth rate of 5.8%, an increase of 0.8 percentage points and a decrease of 2.4 percentage points respectively compared with the same period last year. In addition, the growth rate of the service industry in Beijing, Chengdu, Hangzhou, Wuhan and Suzhou was higher than the national average (4.6%), at 5.4%, 5.1%, 5.0%, 4.9% and 4.7% respectively, but lower than the same period last year by 1.2, 0.5, 4.3, 3, 0.6 and 0.5 percentage points respectively. The growth rate of the service industry in Nanjing was the same as that of the whole country, while the growth rates in Shenzhen and Guangzhou were lower than that of the whole country, at only 3.5% and 2.8% respectively.

Zheng Tiancheng told reporters that this is mainly related to insufficient market confidence. Some key industries within the service industry, such as the real estate industry, are under great pressure. However, the production service industry and high-tech service industry still show a good growth trend. In the first half of the year, the added value of Shanghai's information transmission, software and information technology services increased by 13.4%; Beijing's information services increased by 12.4%; Guangzhou and Wuhan's scientific research and scientific and technological services increased by 22.5% and 9.7% respectively, which are all remarkable performances.

Two strong and one weak among the “three horses”

Judging from the "three engines" that drive economic growth, the top ten cities in terms of GDP in the first half of the year showed an unbalanced situation of two strong and one weak, among which investment and foreign trade exports were generally good, while consumption was relatively weak.

The most impressive performance is in the export data. Among them, Shenzhen performed particularly well. In the first half of the year, it ranked first among the top ten cities in terms of total export volume, export growth rate, export increment and total import and export volume, with export increment exceeding 350 billion yuan in half a year. In addition, the export growth rates of Suzhou and Wuhan reached 9.9% and 9.8% respectively.

Fixed asset investment data performed well. In the first half of the year, the growth rates of fixed asset investment in Shanghai, Beijing and Shenzhen were 10.2%, 9.6% and 8.9% respectively, 6.3, 5.5 and 5 percentage points higher than the national average of 3.9%. In addition, the growth rates of fixed asset investment in Suzhou and Chengdu were also higher than the national average, indicating that my country's investment is gathering towards core cities.

Consumption data was weak overall, and the growth rate of total retail sales of consumer goods in the top ten cities in terms of GDP generally slowed down. Zheng Tiancheng analyzed that the current weak consumption is still an important factor hindering the faster development of my country's GDP. In the next step, we should continue to promote economic policies aimed at promoting consumption.