China's home prices continue to ease in May

China's home prices in 70 large and medium-sized cities continued the downward trend in May, though the pace of decline slowed, the National Bureau of Statistics said on Thursday.

In May, 43 out of the 70 cities saw a month-on-month drop in new home sales prices, down from 47 in April, data from the NBS showed.

New home prices in four first-tier cities – Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen and Guangzhou – edged up 0.4 percent month on month in May, widening 0.2 percentage points from that in April.

A total of 31 second-tier cities witnessed a month-on-month decline of 0.1 percent in new home prices, while 35 third-tier cities saw a month-on-month decline of 0.3 percent in new home prices.

Prices of resale homes in the four first-tier cities remained unchanged month on month in May. Second-tier and third-tier cities saw their prices of resale homes edge down 0.3 percent and 0.5 percent on a monthly basis, respectively.