The Washington-based official, who asked not to be named, said China had already taken a series of economic measures to respond to the outbreak, and would stick to a flexible monetary policy as it sought to rapidly restore normal production across the country.
"It's going to have a big impact in the first quarter of the year, but with the restoration of economic orders, we hope the situation should be much better from the second quarter," the official said. "If the situation does not get worse ... I believe the Chinese economy is going to recover very rapidly."
The outbreak has slowed in China, with 327 new cases reported on Friday, the lowest since Jan. 23, bringing the total there to 78,800 cases and almost 2,800 deaths. However, the disease is now spreading across the globe, with the first case reported in Nigeria on Friday and 888 people infected in Italy.
The International Monetary Fund has said the outbreak will likely lower China's economic growth by 0.4 percentage point this year to 5.6% and shave 0.1 percentage point from global growth, but it continues to look at more dire scenarios.
The Chinese official said the coronavirus outbreak could cause "a dramatic fall" in the global economy if it spread to a wide range of countries, but gave no specific forecasts.
Beijing remained committed to boosting purchases of U.S. goods and services by $200 billion under the Phase 1 trade deal over the next two years, the official said, noting moves by China's customs office to lift ban on beef and other products.