China's Q4 GDP expands faster-than-expected 9.8% (by Michael Kitchen)

LOS ANGELES (MarketWatch) -- China's economy grew faster than expected in the fourth quarter, with the National Bureau of Statistics reporting Thursday that gross domestic product was up 9.8% from the year-earlier period, and was up 10.3% for all of 2010. The result was above a fourth-quarter forecast for a 9.2% rise, according to a Dow Jones Newswires survey, while the full-year growth beat respective Dow Jones and Reuters forecasts of 10.1% and 10.2%. Consumer inflation hit 4.6% year-on-year in December, a little below a Dow Jones projection of 4.7% and a FactSet forecast of 4.8%. China's GDP had risen 9.6% in the third quarter, while the consumer price index had climbed 5.1% year-on-year in November. In other data released Thursday, the producer price index increased 5.9% in December from a year earlier, and 2010 urban fixed-asset investment was up 24.5% in 2010.