China’s services sector expanded at its slowest pace since July in October, with business confidence easing as firms contended with intense competition and rising costs, according to a private-sector survey released on Wednesday and reported by the Daily Mirror on 4 November.
The RatingDog China General Services PMI fell to 50.8 in October from 51.6 in September. The index remained above the 50 mark that separates expansion from contraction, but the reading was its weakest in three months.
What the survey found
New business continued to grow at a rate broadly unchanged from September. New export business rose for a sixth consecutive month, extending the longest growth streak recorded since 2024.
Services firms kept adding both full-time and part-time staff to handle existing workloads.
Pricing told a different story. Heightened competition drove firms to lower their average selling prices for a second straight month, and the week-long Golden Week holiday provided little support. Meanwhile input prices rose at their quickest pace in five months, driven by higher costs for materials, fuel and wages — squeezing margins from both directions.
Business confidence slipped to its lowest level since July, with firms citing rising input costs and intensifying competition.
Why it matters for Sri Lanka
China is among Sri Lanka’s largest trading partners and a significant source of investment and inbound tourism. Chinese services activity is a read on domestic demand in that market, and a cooling, margin-squeezed services sector there bears on consumer appetite relevant to Sri Lankan exporters and to tourist arrivals.
The survey is a private-sector gauge and is compiled separately from China’s official purchasing managers’ index published by state statisticians, which covers a different sample of firms. The two series can diverge. The report cited here gives the services reading only and does not include a manufacturing figure for October.