Following a series of highly publicized economic and political measures by the central government, the third-quarter performance helped slow economic growth for the first nine months of 2006 to 10.7 percent.

Asia's second-largest economy and the world's fourth biggest had grown by a red-hot 11.3 percent in the three months to June and by 10.9 percent in the first half, a much faster pace than the 10.2 percent recorded for all 2005.

"The momentum of fast growth has started to come under control," National Bureau of Statistics spokesman Li Xiaochao said at press conference to release the data, with analysts giving cautious backing to the assessment.

"The government will probably see this as the situation they wanted to achieve," said Chen Xindong, a Beijing-based economist for BNP Paribas.

"The Chinese government does not want to kill the growth momentum but they don't want the economy to continue accelerating, so from that point of view the outcome is in line with their objectives," Chen said.

Thursday's data showed fixed asset investment, one of the key economic drivers, had slowed to 27.3 percent growth in the nine months to September, compared with 30.9 percent in the second quarter alone.