BEIJING, Dec. 28 -- Profit growth at China’s industrial companies slowed in November, mainly due to a higher comparative base and a recent slowdown in manufacturing investment.

Industrial profit expanded 9.7 percent from a year earlier to 707.5 billion yuan (US$116.6 billion) last month, down from 15.1 percent in October and 18.4 percent in September, the National Bureau of Statistics said yesterday.

Bureau researcher He Ping said the moderation was due to a higher comparative base. Industrial profit had jumped 22.8 percent in November 2012 and 21.6 percent in October that year.

He said on the whole that growth remained stable in the first 11 months as industrial profit increased 13.2 percent to 5.32 trillion yuan.

Zhu Haibin, chief economist for China at JPMorgan, said the moderation has accompanied a recent slowdown in manufacturing investment growth after a solid recovery in the third quarter. Manufacturing investment grew 18.6 percent in November, compared with 19.1 percent in October.

“What’s worrisome is that the recovery in total profit continued to be concentrated in just a few sectors, and profit from principal businesses remained on the softer side,” Zhu said.

According to the bureau, profit growth was mainly bolstered by the automobile, power consumption, petroleum, ferrous metal smelting and non-metallic mineral product sectors. Profits in these five industries accounted for 56.7 percent of the increase in total industrial income.

Meanwhile, profit from principal business, which refers to the core business of each manufacturer, declined 1.8 percent year on year, compared with an increase of 6 percent in October.

“Going into the new year, manufacturing investment could stabilize, benefiting from further recovery in the global economy, gradual capacity adjustment and pricing reform on the domestic front,” Zhu said.

Some analysts predicted underlying risks of slower growth in the world’s second-largest economy. Xue Jun, an economist at Citic Securities Co, said the country’s economy has shown signs of weakness in the past two months.

Also yesterday, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology forecast the country’s industrial production will grow 9.8 percent this year, down from last year’s 10 percent.