BEIJING - China's State-owned enterprises (SOEs) that are administered to by the central government reported a year-on-year increase of 13.1 percent in net profits in the first eight months of 2011.

However, growth in the January-August period was 2.6 percentage points lower than that of the first seven months of this year, indicating a slowdown in August, according to a statement by the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission (SASAC) on its website Sept 20.

The combined net profits of the 119 centrally administered SOEs totaled 624.2 billion yuan ($97.7 billion) from January to August.

The SASAC statement did not give details on what drove the profit increase or the slower growth in the period.

Business revenues for 119 SOE conglomerations rose 24.2 percent year-on-year, reaching 13.145 trillion yuan from January to August.

The centrally administered SOEs had 1.14 trillion yuan payable in taxes and fees for the first eight months, up 27.6 percent from the same period last year, according to the statement.