The offshore yuan steadied to around 7.12 per dollar on Monday, halting the previous session’s losses, as investors monitored US-China talks and digested weaker-than-expected domestic economic data. US and Chinese officials began discussions in Madrid on Sunday aimed at easing tensions over national security and trade, including a looming deadline for Chinese short video app TikTok to divest and Washington’s push for allies to impose tariffs on Beijing over Russian oil.
The talks marked the fourth such meeting in four months across European capitals. Meanwhile, fresh Chinese data underscored a fragile outlook, with retail sales up just 3.4% in August, the slowest in eight months, and industrial output growth easing to 5.2%, its weakest in a year. Fixed-asset investment rose only 0.5% in January–August, well below forecasts, while the jobless rate climbed to a six-month high of 5.3%. Markets now turn to this week’s loan prime rate decision, with expectations pointing to no change.
