An industrial robot is displayed at the fourth China (Guangdong) International Internet Plus Expo in Foshan, Guangdong province. (PHOTO / XINHUA)

BEIJING — Profits of China's major industrial firms dropped 3.3 percent year-on-year last year, data from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) showed Monday.

The decline widened from a 2.1-percent decrease registered during the first 11 months of 2019.

"Factors including weak demand, lower prices of industrial products and rising costs led to the fall in profits," said NBS senior statistician Zhu Hong.

Factors including weak demand, lower prices of industrial products and rising costs led to the fall in profits

Zhu Hong, Senior statistician, National Bureau of Statistics

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Revenues of major industrial companies rose 3.8 percent year-on-year last year, slowing from an 8.6-percent growth in 2018. Coupled with higher costs, the profitability was squeezed, Zhu noted.

Key industrial sectors such as steel, chemical engineering, automobile and petroleum processing reported steep profit declines, down by 37.6 percent, 25.6 percent, 15.9 percent and 42.5 percent from a year earlier, respectively.

Profits of state-owned industrial firms dropped 12 percent from one year earlier to 1.64 trillion yuan (about US$2.34 billion).

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Thanks to the large-scale tax and fee cuts and other support policies, private and small companies enjoyed better business environment. Their profits bucked the downward trend by growing 2.2 percent and 5 percent year-on-year, Zhu said.

In December alone, profits of major industrial firms dipped 6.3 percent year-on-year.