In May, the sales and production of automobiles witnessed decline than that of last month. Comparing with the same period of last year, the sales and production continued to increase, of which the growth of sales was approximately 10%. This month, the sales-output ratio reached 101.3%. The business inventories further decreased.
        This month, the production and sales of automobiles in China reached 2,065,000 and 2,092,000 units respectively, down 5.1% and 1.7% than that of last month, but up 5% and 9.8% year on year. For the first five months, the production and sales of automobiles were 10,844,000 and 10,755,000 units respectively, up 5.8% and 7% year on year, 2.6 percentage points and 4.9 percentage points higher than the same period of last year.