Business / Policy Watch

China will increase retail oil prices on Feb 9

By DU JUAN (chinadaily.com.cn) Updated: 2015-02-04 14:08

UBS projects the country's GDP to grow at 6.8 percent in 2015, with the oil slump likely offsetting downward uncertainty.

Ma Jun, chief economist of the central bank's research bureau, estimates that China's real GDP growth will edge up 0.12 percentage points if the average oil price drops by 10 percent year on year.

The country imported 308.4 million tons of crude oil in 2014 worth $228.3 billion, reported Xinhua news quoting official data, which account for about 58 percent of its oil consumption.

"The oil slump is also expected to have a stabilizing effect on renminbi exchange rate," said Xie Yaxuan, adding that currency values have diverged as the US dollar became stronger.

Cut in spending

The Mexican government announced on Friday that it will cut 2015 spending by 0.7 percent of GDP in response to lowered oil prices which are likely to persist for years.

Mexico's state-owned oil and electricity companies will also cut their own outlays, and all the reductions will have a marginal effect on this year's growth, according to Bloomberg.

Russia, another world's energy exporter, decided to decrease spending by at least 5 percent annually in real terms for three years and seek a more balanced budget by 2017, reported the agency.

 

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