China Vanke posted slower profit growth in the first half of 2014 compared with robust gains in the same period of last year. Net profits edged up 5.55% year-on-year to CNY4.81 billion in the first six months. The growth was sharply down from a 22% increase in net profits in the first half of 2013. Vanke said first-half real estate sales across China had cooled from last year but still grew steadily compared with the figures of 2012. The company achieved 14.6% growth in total building area sold in the first half, as well as a 20.6% increase in sales revenue. Small apartments accounted for as much as 92% of the commodity housing it sold in the first six months. Beijing Capital Land saw its total building area sold in the first half rise only 1.1% from a year earlier. Many experts have ruled out the possibility of a “hard landing” for China’s property sector. They predicted the sector would recover in the fourth quarter as banks become more lenient on issuing loans amid sufficient credit supply. China Vanke noted the government’s fine-tuning on the once-sizzling property market has become more targeted and market-oriented, the Shanghai Daily reports.

A month-on-month rise in home prices was registered in just two cities in July, a national survey showed. The number of Chinese cities where prices fell from a month earlier rose to 64 in July from 55 in June, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), which tracks housing prices in 70 major cities. Prices were flat in four cities, down from seven in June. While 65 cities continued to record price gains on a year-on-year basis, all of them saw slower growth. The national housing price fell an average of 0.9% month-on-month in July, the third straight monthly drop since June 2012. Nationwide, Hangzhou again led decliners as home prices in the capital of Zhejiang province shed 2.5% from June. Xiamen in Fujian province and Dali in Yunnan province were the only two cities where home prices grew monthly by 0.2% and 0.1%, respectively. In Shanghai, Beijing, Guangzhou and Shenzhen, new home prices in July fell 1.4%, 1.3%, 1.3% and 0.6%, respectively, from June. On an annual basis, home prices rose in 65 of the 70 cities in July, down by four from June. Prices fell in Wenzhou and Hangzhou in Zhejiang province and Shaoguan in Guangdong province from a year earlier while the remaining two cities saw flat prices.

Sweden’s Inter Ikea Systems, the world’s largest retailer of home furnishings, said China became one of its top 10 markets by revenue for the first time in the current fiscal year. “In the coming years, Ikea will maintain the expansion speed of opening at least three stores a year, as we did in the past several years, so that we will see China become one of our top five markets before 2020, for sure,” Zhu Changlai, Ikea’s Retail Manager for China said. Stores in China are the fastest-growing in the world for the group. Zhu said that Ikea’s family membership increased by 13% in the first 11 months of fiscal 2014 to 9.5 million in China, and visits to its websites jumped by 16%. CEO Peter Agnefjall said that Ikea expected revenue from China to more than double by 2020, based on the CNY6.3 billion it generated in fiscal 2013. Ikea now has only 15 stores in 12 cities in China, a small number for a group that operates more than 350 stores in 44 countries. “We will see a new store opening its doors to local consumers in Wuhan, Hubei province, in September, and two others in Xian, Shaanxi province, and Hangzhou, Zhejiang province, in 2015,” said Zhu. “By 2020, Ikea plans to have 34 stores in China.” Despite rapid revenue growth in the country, the average prices of Ikea products in China have been cut by about 20% in the past five years, the China Daily reports.

The Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) will beef up the number of foreign researchers it attracts, as part of a move to promote internationalization for the next five years. Foreign researchers will account for 3% of the total, up from 1% currently. The Academy now has 56,000 researchers, excluding post-doctorate and visiting scholars. The Academy launched a program called the CAS President’s International Fellowship Initiative to enhance internationalization by hiring more foreign researchers in August. The Academy aims to attract four types of international researchers: distinguished scientists who are well-recognized in their academic fields; visiting scientists holding tenured positions with well-known international universities, research institutions or enterprises; post-doctoral researchers with excellent performances; and PhD students. One hundred post-doctoral researchers will receive an annual funding of CNY200,000 apiece to conduct collaborative research for one to two years with CAS, the China Daily reports.

The China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) has terminated the review of 129 companies applying for initial public offerings (IPOs) out of 628 companies in line for approval on August 7. Of the 129 companies, online game operator Beijing Kylin Culture Co ranked first in terms of the number of investors with 13 PE and VC institutions, followed by Dalian Wanda Commercial Properties Co and Chongqing Qinchuan Industry (Group) Co, each with 11 PE and VC institutions.