(Bloomberg) -- With China’s week-long Two Sessions annual meetings underway, investors are looking for signals that the nation’s new economic and political leaders will lay the ground for fresh investment opportunities.

So far, economic targets have been conservative and analysts including Goldman Sachs Group Inc. expect policy to move toward normalization this year, compared with the expansionary policy support in 2022.

Gross domestic product growth of “around 5%” appears conservative, compared with the “above 5%” goal some investors were expecting. The median estimate from a Bloomberg survey of economists shows China’s economy will grow 5.3% in 2023:

China’s fiscal on-budget deficit target is 3% of GDP and the local government special bond issuance quota is 3.8 trillion yuan ($550 billion). Both are higher than the 2022 target, but smaller than consensus:

Local governments’ special bond issuance saw a big jump in January:

Household and bank debt will need to keep growing to reach the economic target:

MSCI China saw the first weekly gain ahead of the NPC after a four-week slump:

But history shows that Chinese markets tend to fall during the NPC. The CSI 300 fell in seven of the past 10 Party Congress weeks:

NOTE: Ernest Tsang is a markets producer for Bloomberg TV. The observations are his own and not intended as investment advice. For more markets analysis, see the MLIV blog.

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