TOKYO -- Big American companies have maintained double-digit earnings growth while their Chinese peers have slowed sharply, with the U.S.-China trade war adding to the negative effect of Beijing's push to reduce corporate debt.
U.S.-headquartered companies' net profits rose 10% in fiscal 2018, based on a Nikkei analysis of QUICK-FactSet data on about 7,800 global companies with market capitalizations of at least $1 billion. While this marked a slowdown from the year-earlier expansion of nearly 20%, China-based companies' profit growth plunged to 3% from 22%.
