Amid the surging growth of China's box office, it saw a 4.6 percent decline in the second quarter of 2016, with the first quarter gaining the lowest it had for years at 21 percent, according to local news outlets.

The plunge marks China box office's first year-on-year quarterly decline in over five years. In 2015, China experienced a whopping 50 percent increase in its first quarter, reaching 14.49 billion yuan (about $2.2 billion), far behind the 9.66 billion yuan ($1.4 billion) in 2014.

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China, which is poised to become the largest movie market in the world soon, also raked in over $1 billion in February, beating North America for the second month ever.

However, between April and June this year, the momentum stopped with ticket sales plunging to $1.51 billion, down 4.6 percent from the $1.58 billion in 2015's second quarter, Ent Group, a box office monitor from Beijing, told The Hollywood Reporter.

The last time China saw a fall was the first quarter of 2011.

The first quarter of this year saw a positive trend thanks to the record-breaking hits released last February including Stephen Cow's The Mermaid with $528 million, The Monkey King 2 with $185.4 million, From Vegas to Macau 3 with $172.1 million, and Zootopia with $235.5 million.

In the other hand, the second quarter was dominated by Hollywood titles, including Warcraft with $220 million, Captain America: Civil War with $190.4 million, The Jungle Book with $150.1 million and X-Men: Apocalypse with $118.6 million.

Such figures are still dwarfed by the top Hollywood imports in Q2 last year with Furious 7 at $390.9 million, Avengers: Age of Ultron at $240.1 million, and Jurassic World with $228.7 million.  

Meanwhile, an official report from the State Administration of Press Publication Radio, Film and Television is expected to be out soon.

TagsChina box office, Movies