Business revenues of China's state-owned enterprises (SOEs) dropped 3.5 percent in the first eight months from the same period last year, the Ministry of Finance (MOF) said Friday.

Business revenue stood at 13.68 trillion yuan (2.00 trillion U.S. dollars) in the first eight months, with profits at 813.51 billion yuan (119.11 billion U.S. dollars), down 19.6 percent year on year.

The rate of decline in profits was 3.2 percentage points lower than the January-July figure.

The firms include SOEs directly controlled by the central government and SOEs supervised by local governments, but exclude state-owned financial enterprises.

(Xinhua News Agency September 19, 2009)