China’s Factory-Gate Inflation Accelerates to 5.7% as Consumer Inflation Cools

October producer prices rose at their fastest annual pace since June 2022. Consumer prices were up 0.7% from a year earlier, a slowdown from September.

Editorial Staff

November 9, 2026

1–2 minutes

asia, China, Consumer Prices, Energy, inflation

October producer prices rose at their fastest annual pace since June 2022. Consumer prices were up 0.7% from a year earlier, a slowdown from September.

Rows of coiled steel on the floor of a rolling mill in China. — Steel coils at a rolling mill in China, photographed in 2019. Photo by Antoniorosset, CC BY-SA 4.0. Cropped and resized.

China’s factory-gate prices rose 5.7% from a year earlier in October, up from 5.0% in September, the National Bureau of Statistics said on Monday. It was the strongest annual increase since June 2022, according to Reuters. Over the same period, consumer inflation slowed to 0.7% from 0.9%.

The producer price index measures the prices industrial firms receive when goods leave the factory. The consumer price index tracks a different basket, including food and services that households buy. In October, the two measures showed how differently the same month could feel for manufacturers and shoppers.

Higher energy prices reached industrial suppliers

The statistics bureau reported annual price increases of 36.6% in coal mining and washing and 35.0% in oil and natural gas extraction. Prices in petroleum, coal and other fuel processing climbed 29.9%, while prices in chemical raw materials and chemical products rose 16.4%. Reuters linked much of the increase to higher global energy prices.

Factory-gate prices rose 0.7% from September. That monthly increase was smaller than September’s 1.2%, even as the year-on-year rate accelerated. The two comparisons use different starting points, so the monthly pace can slow while the annual rate rises.

Household inflation eased

Consumer prices were flat from September. Core inflation, which excludes food and energy, slipped to 0.8% year on year from 1.0%. Fresh vegetable prices fell 16.9% from a year earlier and pork prices fell 8.6%, helping to hold down the headline rate.

For manufacturers buying energy and other industrial inputs, rising prices upstream can squeeze margins when demand makes it difficult to raise selling prices. The October figures leave open how much of the increase will reach households, and how quickly. The next releases will help show whether the gap between producer and consumer inflation persists.