BEIJING, Aug. 25 (Xinhua) -- Profits of companies controlled by China's central government continued to fall in the first seven months, but at a slower pace, the state-owned enterprise (SOE) watchdog said Tuesday.

The 136 SOEs directly controlled by the central government generated total profits of 398.35 billion yuan (58.31 billion U.S. dollars) from January to July, down 20.9 percent year on year. 

The decline was 5.3 percentage points lower than the January-June figure, according to the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission (SASAC).

The profits for July alone were 80.98 billion yuan, a rise of 7.7 percent from June.  

Sales revenue in the first seven months fell 6.2 percent from the same period a year ago to 6.39 trillion yuan. The decrease was0.1 percentage points lower than the first half.

Editor: Lin Zhi