Chinese Industrial Production accelerated further in December 2019, rising 6.9% year-over-year according to today's estimates from China's National Bureau of Statistics ((NBS)). That was a full percentage point above consensus. IP had bottomed out right in August at a record low 4.4%, and then, just as this wave of renewed optimism swept the world, it has rebounded alongside it.
Rather than suggest the global economy is picking up, or ended last year in a "good place", when placed in context of the rest of China's economic numbers, we are left with the impression of