China new bank loans grow modestly

Shanghai / AFP

Chinese bank lending grew modestly month-on-month in November, official data showed on Wednesday, after being almost halved in October, the latest indication that the country’s economy may be stabilising.
New loans extended by banks rose to 794.6 billion yuan ($115.1 billion) last month, compared with 651.3 billion yuan in October, said the People’s Bank of China (PBoC), the country’s central bank.
Analysts said the rising lending
figure is consistent with the stronger economic growth reported for
November.
The lending figure is “in line with the recent macro-economic figures which shows the demand in the real economy has recovered to a certain degree”, Liu Dongliang, a Shenzhen-based senior analyst with China Merchants Bank, said in a research note.
Chinese exports snapped a seven-month losing streak and rose 0.1 percent in November while import also gained 6.7 percent. Its producer prices rose at their fastest pace for five years last month while industrial output and retail sales growth both accelerated in November.
In a separate statement, the central bank said total social financing — an alternative measure of credit in the real economy — surged to 1.74 trillion yuan from 896.3 billion yuan in October, beating Bloomberg’s median estimate of 1.1 trillion yuan.
Analysts said that despite the rising credit, China will not raise its interest rate. Julian Evans-Pritchard, China Economist at Capital Economics said: “we don’t expect any move to raise benchmark rates or the required reserve ratio.”
“Instead, we expect the PBOC to continue to focus on curtailing credit demand via mortgage restrictions and tighter oversight of local governments’ off-budget borrowing.”