China’s Industrial Profit Falls on Covid-19 Measures, Bad Weather

China’s industrial profit dropped in the first seven months of the year, reversing a year-on-year increase in the first half of the year, as sporadic Covid-19 outbreaks and bad weather weighed on the world’s second-largest economy. Industrial profit dropped 1.1% from a year earlier in the January-to-July period, offsetting a 1% increase reported in the first half of the year, the National Bureau of Statistics said Saturday. A record heat wave and drought cut into China’s industrial production, and Beijing recently unveiled tens of billions in economic support for power generation and agriculture.