Such a rapid pace of expansion could not continue forever and this period is now clearly coming to an end. But what sort of slowdown China experiences during the next few years remains unclear.

The government is hoping for a gradual decline in growth to more sustainable levels which will take some of the steam out of property markets, but without damaging employment too much. The performance of the economy in the first half of the year, when it expanded by 10.4 per cent, appeared to indicate this was happening. “The slowdown has only been gradual and will likely remain so for the rest of the year,” says Qu Hongbin, economist at HSBC in Hong Kong.

However, there is an increasing amount of evidence that China might suffer a much sharper slowdown that would include a sharp drop in property prices, a decline in exports and problems in the banking system. Stephen Green, economist at Standard Chartered Bank in Shanghai, has one of the more pessimistic outlooks for China, predicting 7.9 per cent growth next year and 7.1 per cent the year after.