BEIJING - China's excavator producers reported stronger sales in the first month of 2018, data with China Construction Machinery Association showed Wednesday.

Twenty-five leading excavator makers sold 10,687 digging machines in January, up 135 percent year-on-year, compared with a 102.6 percent increase in December sales.

A total of 9,547 excavators were sold in the domestic market last month, up 141.9 percent from a year earlier, while overseas sales rose 89.5 percent to 1,137 machines.

Sales of digging machines are a telling indicator of the vitality of a country's economic activity as growing demand for them is usually backed by booming mining and infrastructure development.

Chinese digging machine makers sold more than 140,000 excavators last year, surging 99.5 percent year-on-year.

China's economy expanded by a forecast-beating 6.9 percent in 2017, picking up for the first time in seven years and well above the government annual target of around 6.5 percent.

Given the prospects for stable economic expansion and a high comparison base, analysts estimated that digging machine sales in China might grow 10 percent to 20 percent in 2018.