China Has the Foundation and Conditions to Maintain Stable and Improving Economic Performance

In 2025, the Chinese economy advanced under pressure, moving towards innovation and quality, successfully concluding the 14th Five-Year Plan. The new journey of the 15th Five-Year Plan has commenced. Observing the development momentum in the inaugural year, the Chinese economy possesses the foundation and conditions to maintain stable and improving operations, ensuring a good start and a solid first step for the "15th Five-Year Plan" period. Assessing the trend, the long-term positive fundamentals of China's economy remain unchanged, with supportive factors for high-quality development continuously accumulating and strengthening. During the 14th Five-Year Plan period, China's total economic output successively surpassed four major thresholds of 110 trillion, 120 trillion, 130 trillion, and 140 trillion yuan. The economic increment over five years exceeded 36 trillion yuan, marking significant advancements in economic power, scientific and technological capabilities, defense strength, and comprehensive national power, fully demonstrating the economy's immense resilience and potential. China firmly maintains its position as the world's second-largest economy and the largest manufacturing nation, leads globally in goods trade volume, and is the world's second-largest consumer market and largest online retail market, equipping it with the capacity and confidence to address various risks and challenges. When observing the Chinese economy, one must consider not only its "scale" but, more importantly, its "constitution." By relying on innovation to empower high-quality development, China's R&D expenditure intensity surpassed the OECD average for the first time in 2025, yielding a plethora of original and disruptive innovations. Fields such as artificial intelligence, biopharmaceuticals, and robotics are positioned in the global first tier, green and low-carbon transformation is deepening, and the digital economy is flourishing. These new significant achievements in China's economic and social development have laid a more solid foundation for successfully navigating the new journey of the "15th Five-Year Plan." Evaluating the situation, despite facing new difficulties and challenges both internationally and domestically, the main theme of stable economic operation in China remains unaltered. In 2025, the Chinese economy withstood multiple pressures to maintain a stable yet progressive development trend, achieving new results in high-quality development. Domestic demand became the primary driver of transformation and upgrading, contributing over 67% to economic growth in 2025, with consumption alone contributing 52%. Development resilience was evident as goods trade volume reached a new record high, and foreign exchange reserves exceeded $3.3 trillion. Livelihood safeguards were effective and robust, with employment remaining generally stable. Since September 2025, the core CPI year-on-year increase has remained above 1% for four consecutive months. In December, the Manufacturing Purchasing Managers' Index returned to expansionary territory, while the flows of people, goods, and information maintained relatively rapid growth, indicating a continuous increase in positive factors within economic operations. Concurrently, there is a clear recognition that numerous old problems and new challenges persist in economic development, the impact of changes in the external environment is deepening, and the domestic contradiction of strong supply versus weak demand is prominent. In response, the Central Economic Work Conference has made comprehensive部署 (deployments). In 2026, China will continue to implement more proactive and effective macro policies, enhancing counter-cyclical and cross-cyclical adjustments. As endogenous economic momentum strengthens and macro policies take effect, the trend of stable and improving economic performance will be continuously consolidated and expanded. Considering the advantages, China's economy boasts stable foundations, multiple strengths, strong resilience, and vast potential. The advantages of the socialist system with Chinese characteristics, the super-sized market, the complete industrial system, and the abundant talent resources will become even more pronounced. Scientific and technological innovation has opened up space for industrial leaps, driving the renewal and upgrading of traditional动能 (kinetic energy), the accumulation and formation of new动能 (kinetic energy), and the continuous shaping of new advantages, accelerating the growth of new quality productive forces. The structure of resident consumption is shifting from being predominantly goods-based to a balance between goods and services consumption. Digital technology, artificial intelligence, and others continuously spawn new business forms, models, and scenarios. While there are still shortcomings and weaknesses in areas like scientific and technological innovation, industrial upgrading, infrastructure, and improving people's livelihoods, there remains immense potential for expanding domestic demand. The continuous deepening of comprehensive reforms and the substantive progress of high-level opening-up will inject new institutional dividends into economic development. Recently, major international organizations have successively raised their growth forecasts for the Chinese economy, highlighting confidence in its development prospects. By accurately recognizing the trends, grasping the situation, and leveraging the advantages, China has the capability and confidence to keep its economic ship steady and far-sailing, no matter what challenges the future may hold.