Economy Talk

How can China beat forecasts while investment falls 7.2%?

I read the GONOM post about China's Q3 and I'm trying to understand how the pieces fit. Growth was 4.5% year on year, above forecasts. Yet fixed-asset investment fell 7.2% from January to September, and retail sales were weak at 1.1% in September.

If people are not buying much and companies and builders are investing less, the growth must come almost entirely from exports. The article says exports rose more than 16% in the first three quarters.

Is that really enough to carry an economy of that size? And is this a normal pattern or unusual? I work in marketing in Gothenburg and I'm more used to reading consumer data than GDP, so please correct me if I misunderstood something.