BEIJING, Jan. 28 (Xinhua) -- Profits of China's major industrial firms grew 10.3 percent year on year in 2018, but lower than the 21-percent expansion for 2017, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) said Monday.

Combined profits at industrial firms with annual revenue of more than 20 million yuan ($2.96 million) reached 6.64 trillion yuan last year.

The 2018 profit growth is lower than the 21-percent expansion for 2017, but still remained on a steady growth track, according to NBS statistician He Ping.

Profits fell 1.9 percent year on year last December, down further from a drop of 1.8 percent in November.

State-owned players saw profits up 12.6 percent year on year in 2018, compared with 45.1-percent growth in 2017, while private firms' profit growth accelerated from 11.7 percent in 2017 to 11.9 percent last year.

Profits in 32 of the 41 sectors surveyed rose compared with a year earlier.

The mining sector's profits expanded 40.1 percent year on year, with the petroleum and natural gas mining subsector posting a robust growth of 440 percent.

The manufacturing sector's earnings grew 8.7 percent year on year.

Among the nine sectors with shrinking profits, non-ferrous metals smelting and rolling decreased 9 percent in profits, while automobile manufacturing fell by 4.7 percent year on year.