In the January-April period this year, the ferrous metal smelting and rolling sector in China recorded a gross profit of RMB 16.92 billion ($2.35 billion), compared to a gross loss of RMB 22.22 billion recorded in the same period of last year, as announced by China's National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) on May 27.
The automotive sector recorded a gross profit of RMB 132.55 billion ($18.4 billion) in the given period, down 5.1 percent year on year.
At the same time, the ferrous metals mining and dressing sector, the metal manufacturing sector and the railway, shipping, aerospace and other transportation equipment manufacturing sector recorded gross profits of RMB 11.69 billion ($1.1 billion), RMB 44.73 billion ($3.9 billion) and RMB 39.21 billion ($3.5 billion) in the first four months, down 45.4 percent, up 11.1 percent and up 59.2 percent year on year, respectively.
In the given period, the aggregate gross profit of large and medium-sized industrial enterprises in China amounted to RMB 2.11702 trillion ($0.29 trillion), up 1.4 percent year on year.