China's Private Firms Posted Biggest Profit Growth

China’s industrial firms posted a 25.4% year-on-year rise in profits to a collective 5.45 trillion yuan ($863.68 billion) in 2011, reported the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).

For the month of December industrial profits surged 31.5% from a year earlier to 790.7 billion yuan ($120 bil.). But the full-year growth rate declined from the 32% year-on-year growth seen during the first quarter, 28.7% during the first half, and 27% in the first three quarters.

Private firms posted the strongest profit growth last year, with an overall 46% year-on-year growth, followed by 34% logged by collectively-owned enterprises and 31.2% by equity-holding companies.

The data was compiled from a pool of industrial firms with at least 20 million yuan ($3.2 mil.) in annual sales revenues.

Thirty-seven of the 39 industrial sectors surveyed posted year-on-year profit growth in 2011, while only two posted declines.

Profits of the petroleum and natural gas extraction businesses jumped 44.8% year-on-year. The ferrous metal mining sector surged 53%.

Oil refining, coking and nuclear-fuel processing sectors saw profits plunge 92.8% year-on-year, while electricity and heating power producers and suppliers saw profits slide 11%.