The Chinese consumption impulse registered an apathetic 3% for last month in key data out of Beijing on Monday.

“Apathetic” is probably too polite, or anyway not emphatic enough. So, allow me to emphasize: This was a disappointingly tepid result.

Who could’ve predicted such a poor showing? Not economists. The answer to that question is not economists, who collectively expected retail sales growth across the world’s second-largest economy to come in at around 5% for November versus the same month a year ago.

Do note: Not a single one of the professional forecasters on the record with a prediction for Monday’s retail sales readout ventured a guess as low as the actual result.

Recall that October’s retail sales print was the best since February. The immediate deceleration to the slowest pace in months underscores just how short the half-life, if you will, of China’s stimulus rhetoric really is these days. “Promises, promises,” as the skeptical saying goes.

The fleeting nature of the rebound in domestic consumption growth mirrors the transient character of the stimulus-fueled equity rally, which likewise fizzled.

The figure below shows the difference in the growth rate for retail sales versus industrial production. Suffice to say this remains a two-speed recovery, and the word “recovery” is a misnomer: China’s economy is, if anything, still faltering.

As the chart shows, the gap narrowed in October to the least since retail sales were lapping a string of easy comps late last year. Now, after November’s lackluster consumption showing, the spread’s back out to 2ppt in favor of industrial output.

“November’s retail sales were vastly disappointing,” SocGen’s Wei Yao and Michelle Lam sighed. “Sustaining the recovery would require an improving labor market and stabilizing house prices, which are still not convincing,” they added.

It’s worth asking whether industrial production might be overstated. Some of the growth there may be a consequence of work orders tied to front-loading ahead of the expected implementation of new tariffs.

As reiterated here last week in “Hell Freezes Over,” China’s economy is in a very precarious place, which is to say teetering on the brink of deflation, and at a time when the nation’s relationship with the West is adversarial on polite days.

The Party intends to prioritize domestic demand in 2025, but the ratio of rhetoric to concrete policy proposals is laughable: Actions speak louder than words, and the Party’s all talk.

China’s 10-year benchmark government bond yields, which hit a series of fresh record lows last week, slipped further on Monday to just 1.71%.