China's industrial production climbed 17.4 percent in April as exports and retail sales accelerated in the world's fastest-growing major economy.

That was close to the 17.5 percent median estimate of 18 economists surveyed by Bloomberg News. The National Bureau of Statistics released the figure. Industrial production climbed 17.6 percent in March.

Premier Wen Jiabao is concerned a record trade surplus and a stock market boom will fuel excessive spending on factories, leading to overcapacity, falling prices and bad loans. Fixed- asset investment in urban areas probably jumped 25.3 percent in the first four months from a year earlier, according to a Bloomberg News survey of economists.

"Strong industrial production figures may suggest that fixed-asset investment is picking up and that's not what the government wants,'' said Glenn Maguire, chief Asia economist at Societe Generale SA in Hong Kong. ``We can expect another interest rate increase and more bank reserve ratio hikes if investment takes off again.''

For the first four months, industrial output rose 18 percent from the same period last year. Growth for all of 2006 was 16.6 percent.

Spending on factories and property rose 29.6 percent in the first four months of last year. It slowed to 24.5 percent for 2006 as a whole.

Export Cash

China is trying to cool lending and investment as exports flood the economy with cash. The People's Bank of China has raised interest rates three times since last April, ordered lenders to set aside more money as reserves and sold bills to soak up cash.

China has also curbed land use, cut export rebates and imposed environmental restrictions on development. Premier Wen will lead a task force to cut energy consumption and emissions. The government this week said it ordered 11 companies along the northeastern Songhua River to stop production for pollution violations.

Exports jumped 26.8 percent in April, accelerating from the previous month, as the trade surplus swelled 63 percent from a year earlier to $16.9 billion. Banks extended 1.8 trillion yuan of new loans in the first four months, more than half the total for all last year.

Share Boom

A surging stock market is boosting consumption and swelling companies' investment coffers. Retail sales climbed 15.5 percent in April, the biggest increase since May 2004 after eliminating seasonal distortions. The benchmark CSI 300 Index of shares in Shanghai and Shenzhen is up 76 percent this year, leading to government cautions that a bubble may be forming.

China's economy, the world's fourth largest, has doubled in size in the past five years. Gross domestic product jumped 11.1 percent in the first quarter and 10.7 percent in 2006, the fastest pace in 11 years.

"The industrial investment wave of the last five years is now on line and pumping,'' said Stephen Green, senior economist at Standard Chartered Bank Plc in Shanghai. Domestic and overseas demand for Chinese-made products is strong, Green said.

Jiangxi Copper Co., China's second-biggest producer of the metal, will start production at a new smelter with annual capacity of 300,000 metric tons from Aug. 1, the company said.

Textiles, Metals, Cement

Textile output rose 16 percent in April from a year earlier, the statistics bureau said. Production of ferrous metals jumped 26 percent, and cement output climbed 15 percent.

Anhui Conch Cement Co., China's biggest maker of the building material, reported profit jumped 36 percent in the first quarter on a domestic construction boom. Real estate investment jumped 27 percent through March, according to the statistics bureau.

Still, a slowing U.S. economy may curb demand for products made in China. Gross domestic product in the world's largest economy grew 1.3 percent in the first-quarter, the smallest increase in four years. The U.S. was the biggest buyer of China's exports in 2006.

China's trade surplus last year was a record $177.5 billion and economists expect the gap to top $200 billion in 2007.