[Minor metal] Selenium Prices Inch up in Domestic Market

BEIJING, July 16 -- China's consumer price index (CPI), a main gauge of inflation, dipped 1.7 percent in June from a year earlier, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) said here Thursday.
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; This marks the fifth consecutive month of decline since the index dropped 1.6 percent in February, the first fall since October 2002.
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; The index marked a month-on-month decrease of 0.5 percent, according to NBS. CPI fell 1.4 percent in May year on year.
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; The CPI fell 1.1 percent in the first half of this year from a year earlier.
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Retail commodity prices fell 1.4 percent in the first half. Food prices, which account for about one-third of the CPI, fell 0.3 percent.
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &quot;Slackening market demand and excess production capacity are the main factors impeding the CPI,&quot; said Wang Yiming, vice president of Academy of Macroeconomic Research under the National Development and Reform Commission.
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Meanwhile, summer grain output rose for the sixth consecutive year, which indicated prices would not increase in short term, Wang said. Prices are closely related to grain supply in China.
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &quot;Currently, prices are still falling, demand is weak and the economic growth rate is lower than its potential&quot; said NBS spokesman Li Xiaochao.
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; China does not face an inflation problem as demand was still weak, said Zhang Liqun, a researcher with the Development Research Center of the State Council.
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &quot;Both inflation and deflation will hurt the sound growth of our national economy and we want neither,&quot; Li said. &quot;We want to keep the prices at reasonable level.&quot;
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &quot;We will keep close eye on credit growth as prices and bank lending do have close relationship,&quot; he said.
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; A total of 7.37 trillion yuan of new bank loans were extended in the first half of the year, 4.92 trillion yuan more than in the same period a year ago, according to statistics from the People's Bank of China, the central bank.
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Producer price index (PPI), a major measurement of inflation at the wholesale level, fell 7.8 percent year on year in June, according to the NBS.
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; The decline compared with a 7.2-percent drop in May from the same period last year. The country's PPI dropped 5.9 percent during the January-June period from a year earlier.
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Purchasing prices of raw material, fuel and energy fell 8.7 percent year on year in the first half of this year.
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Despite the widening of the fall in both CPI and PPI, China's economy grew 7.1 percent in the first half from a year earlier.
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; (Source: Xinhua)
&nbsp; 
&nbsp;