Li Ning profit up 44 percent

China's best-known sportswear maker Li Ning Co Ltd reported a 44 percent surge in net earnings last year to 643.3 million yuan ($93.5 million), boosted by a major asset selloff.

The company said that despite some bumps in previous years it was on a steady course for earnings growth.

The sports brand's latest positive performance came after the group put three years of annual losses behind it and moved into the black in 2015.

The company said that the 2016 earnings power lift was underpinned by a 313.2 million yuan gain on the disposal of a 10 percent stake in table tennis equipment maker Double Happiness, helping group revenue last year rise 13 percent to 8.02 billion yuan.

Excluding the one-off gain, however, the underlying profit of 330.3 million yuan for 2016 failed to beat analysts' average forecasts, JPMorgan Chase said in a report. It also said the Hong Kong-listed company was well on its way to revive its business and reinvigorate growth, a view that chimed with the optimistic tone of other analysts towards the group's potential to improve profitability.

sophia@chinadailyhk.com