The following are the highlights of China's business news from the past week:

CPI

China's consumer price index (CPI), a main gauge of inflation, rose 5.4 percent year on year in January. The increase was up from 4.5 percent for December, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).

Food prices grew 20.6 percent year on year last month, up from 17.4 percent in December, while non-food prices gained 1.6 percent, 0.3 percentage points higher than that of December.

PPI

China's producer price index (PPI), which measures costs for goods at the factory gate, rose 0.1 percent year on year in January, the first year-on-year increase in eight months, the NBS's data showed.

On a month-on-month basis, the PPI remained flat for the second month in a row.

FISCAL REVENUE

China's fiscal revenue climbed 3.8 percent year on year to 19.04 trillion yuan (about 2.72 trillion U.S. dollars) in 2019, official data showed.

The central government collected 8.93 trillion yuan in fiscal revenue, up 4.5 percent year on year, while local governments saw fiscal revenue expand 3.2 percent to 10.11 trillion yuan last year, according to data released by the Ministry of Finance.

AUTO SALES

China reported sluggish sales of automobiles in January amid the novel coronavirus outbreak, industry data showed.

The country sold a total of 1.94 million vehicles last month, down 18 percent year on year, according to the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers (CAAM).

Sales of passenger vehicles decreased 20.2 percent year on year and that of new energy vehicle slumped 54.4 percent year on year, said the CAAM.