China’s economy expanded quicker than economists forecast in the third quarter, suggesting monetary and fiscal stimulus is supporting growth and keeping Premier Li Keqiang’s 2015 expansion target within reach.

 

Gross domestic product rose 6.9 percent in the three months through September from a year earlier, the National Bureau of Statistics said Monday, beating economists’ estimates for 6.8 percent. Still, that was the slowest quarterly expansion since the first three months of 2009, based off previously announced data.

 

The economic resilience comes as a stronger services sector and robust consumption help offset weakness in manufacturing and exports.

 

The government has cut interest rates five times since November and boosted infrastructure spending in recent months to keep growth from sliding too far below this year’s target for about 7 percent.

 

“The growth outlook remains subdued,” Louis Kuijs, head of Asia economics at Oxford Economics Ltd. in Hong Kong, wrote in a note before the data release. “Further macroeconomic easing should follow, although there are no major stimulus plans.”

 

Industrial output in September rose 5.7 percent from a year earlier, compared with economists’ median estimate of 6 percent. Retail sales increased 10.9 percent, versus a 10.8 percent gain forecast for the month.

 

Fixed-asset investment climbed 10.3 percent in the first nine months from the same period last year, compared to a median projection of a 10.8 percent increase. That’s the slowest pace of gains since 2000.

 

Challenges have been mounting for China’s manufacturers as exports declined last quarter and a slide in producer prices extended to a record 43 months. That’s helping keep a lid onprices around the world, as China’s factory and export prices tend to move in the same direction.

 

China affects the world more than ever, with Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen last month citing concern about the world’s second-largest economy among reasons for holding off from raising interest rates. China accounted for 13.3 percent of global GDP last year, from less than 5 percent a decade earlier, according to World Bank data.

 

Domestically, property investment and excess industrial capacity have weighed on China’s traditional growth drivers, leaving the economy on track for its slowest full-year expansion in 25 years.

 

While avoiding the kind of all-out stimulus deployed after the global financial crisis, policy makers have deployed a variety of tools to cushion the slowdown. The People’s Bank of China has cut interest rates to record lows and reduced banks’ reserve requirement ratios, the finance ministry has relaxed rules for local authorities to borrow, and the top economic planning body has stepped up project approvals.

 

In the near term, positive signals appeared in lending datareleased by the central bank last week as the broadest measure of new credit exceeded estimates in September. Further out a deceleration looms, with China’s leaders poised to lower their growth target for the next five years, according to economistssurveyed by Bloomberg News.