People work at an intelligent plant for manufacturing the FAW Jiefang J7 trucks in Changchun, northeastern China’s Jilin Province, in this file photo. The profits of China’s major industrial firms with annual main business revenue of at least 20 million yuan (US$2.8 million) increased 16.8% year on year in December last year, data from the National Bureau of Statistics showed. In 2023, the profits of major industrial firms reached 7.69 trillion yuan, down 2.3% year on year, with the pace of decline narrowing by 2.1 percentage points from the first 11 months.   Xinhua