More bad news has come in for China's economy as October's fixed-asset investment grew at its slowest pace in 13 years.

Data released by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) earlier today showed fixed-asset investment had its slowest growth in the past 13 years. It grew by 15.9 percent during the first 10 months of the year, compared to the first 10 months of last year. That was 0.2 percentage points slower than the January-September period.  

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Fixed-asset investments are any investment with physical assets, such as real estate infrastructure and machinery that are owned for more than one year.  It is a good measure of capital spending, and can be an insightful indicator of how much investment is occurring in a country or region.

For the month of October, Industrial output rose 7.7 percent from the same period the previous year, which was also below analysts' expectations. 

Retail sales data, which also is another driver of the country's economy, decelerated as it grew 11.5 percent in October, down from 11.6 percent in September.

A recent Reuters poll of economists forecast industrial output to rise by 8 percent and retail sales by 11.6 percent.

"Economic growth is lower than I expected," Xu Hongcai, director of the Department of Information under the China Center for International Economic Exchanges, told the Global Times. Xu said that poor domestic demand and economic structural adjustments, such as eliminating overcapacity in some industries, are hurting economic growth.

Investment in the real estate sector also slowed slightly, gaining 12.4 percent in the first 10 months year-on-year, down from 12.5 percent for the same period the previous year.

According to a Bloomberg News poll of 22 economists, China could set an economic growth target of about 7 percent for 2015, lower than the government's growth target of about 7.5 percent for this year.  

In a move to spur economic development, the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), China's economic planner, approved a slate of infrastructure projects valued at around 700 billion yuan ($114 billion) in the last month. This includes 16 new railways and five airports, reports Global Times.

Nevertheless, economists say slower growth is inevitable as China transitions to a growth model where consumerism plays a larger role, reports Financial Times. This can prove to be a challenge for economic policy makers to ensure that the investment slowdown is gradual enough to avoid a spike in unemployment and put undue stress on China's financial system.

TagsChina's Investment Growth Skids to 13-Year Low, fixed-asset investment, National Bureau of Statistics, NBS, capital spending, slowest pace in 13 years, Xu Hongcai