Cooling property sector in focus as economy slows

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BEIJING - China's property sector has showed further signs of cooling after years of red-hot growth, according to official data released on Tuesday.

The real estate development climate index dropped 0.61 points from March to 95.79 points in April, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) said in a statement.

The figure has declined month on month for three consecutive months.

This index takes into consideration multiple aspects of the industry, including property investment as well as the area of property sold and sales volume. An index of 100 shows the optimal growth rate, while that from 95 to 100 represents a moderate level.

In nominal terms, the country's investment in property development rose 16.4 percent year on year to 2.23 trillion yuan (about $362 billion) in the first four months of 2014, slowing down by 0.4 percentage points from the first quarter, the NBS said.

The total area of property sales dropped 6.9 percent year on year in the first four months to 277.09 million square meters. The drop was 3.1 percentage points steeper than the decline seen in the first quarter.

Property sales volume was down by 7.8 percent in the same period, compared with a drop of 5.2 percent in the first three months, according to the NBS.

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