China's retail sales slow again in July as policy boost fades and demand weakens

In July 2026, although the impact of the high base from the previous year's consumer goods "trade-in" program eased, the lingering pull-forward effect of the policy, alongside falling international gold prices and prolonged weakness in the property market, continued to weigh on demand.

Data released by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) on August 17 showed that total retail sales of consumer goods rose 0.6% year on year in July, slowing by 0.4 percentage points from the previous month. Excluding automobiles, retail sales grew 2.5% year on year, decelerating by 0.5 percentage