A Chinese investor smiles at prices of shares (red for price rising) at a stock brokerage house in Haikou city, Hainan province, March 23, 2016.[Photo/IC]

BEIJING - More than three in four Chinese listed companies forecast higher profits for 2016 compared with a year earlier, providing further evidence of improvement in the country's macroeconomic environment.

Among 1,731 companies that had filed performance estimates to stock exchanges by Sunday, 1,311 companies -- 75.7 percent of the total -- said their unaudited profits rose year-on-year, according to Wind Info, a Shanghai-based financial information provider.

The proportion is higher than the 65.3 percent of listed companies that reported year-on-year profit rises in the first three quarters of 2016.

Another 20.9 percent of companies said their 2016 profits may drop from a year ago, while the remainder said the changes would be uncertain, Wind Info said.

The stronger profitability coincides with the stabilization of China's economy. The National Bureau of Statistics said Friday that China's GDP expanded by 6.8 percent in the final quarter of 2016, higher than the 6.7 percent for the previous three quarters.

China's producer price index (PPI), which measures costs for goods at the factory gate, jumped 5.5 percent year-on-year in December to reach a five-year high, showing the country's economy enjoyed steadier footing.

Profit forecasts are issued by listed companies to investors through stock exchanges based on unaudited accounting figures before releasing their audited annual reports between January and April.