Economy may have grown as much as 3% in Q2

China’s economy is expected to have expanded as much as 3 percent in the second quarter as it gradually emerged from the shadow of the COVID-19, said veteran market watchers, who played down the possibility of any drastic monetary policy moves.

Second-quarter GDP growth probably hit about 3 percent, with industrial added value back on the expansion track, faster fixed-asset investment growth, and a possible renewed rise in retail sales, economists at Zhixin Investment Research Institute said in a research report sent to the Global Times.

They also cited a continued rebound in property sales and stillweak imports and exports.

Estimates by the research institute of Bank of China were also published Tuesday, saying that decisive achievements in virus containment during the second quarter and the continued push for reopening positioned the economy well for a recovery across the board.

The bank estimated that secondquarter GDP expanded 2.8 percent and forecast 5.2-percent growth in the third quarter, paving the way for a yearly gain of about 2.5 percent.

But there were also less jubilant voices. Describing market forecasts as “overly optimistic,” Yao Yang, director of the China Center for Economic Research and dean of the National School of Development at Peking University, told the Global Times on Tuesday that the economy probably didn’t grow at all in the second quarter due to insufficient consumption.

But even a flat performance is an improvement from the first quarter.

It’s generally reckoned that Chinese policymakers won’t resort to stimulus packages that have been widely adopted in developed economies.