Chinese Flash PMI Comes in Lower, Confirming Weakness in Industrial Metals

The Markit Flash PMI was released today for China, showing that manufacturing expanded at a slower in November than in October. Every component except one was down compared to the previous month. This data point is in line with the weakness we've seen in the industrial metals space that we highlighted here. It's also in line with fiscal stimulus tapering off and thus a slightly slower pace of growth in the last quarter of 2013.