SHANGHAI :China cut its benchmark lending rate and lowered the mortgage reference by a bigger margin on Monday, adding to last week's easing measures, as Beijing boosts efforts to revive an economy hobbled by a property crisis and a resurgence of COVID cases.
The one-year loan prime rate was lowered by 5 basis points to 3.65 per cent at the central bank's monthly fixing on Monday, while the five-year LPR was slashed by 15 basis points to 4.30 per cent. "We anticipate two more 10 bps cuts to the PBOC policy rates over the remainder of this year and continue to forecast a reserve requirement ratio cut next quarter."
But worries over widening policy divergence with other major economies dragged the Chinese yuan, to near two-year lows. The onshore yuan last traded at 6.8258 per dollar. A raft of data, released last week, showed the economy unexpectedly slowed in July and prompted some global investment banks, including Goldman Sachs and Nomura, to revise down their full-year GDP growth forecasts for China.
Capital Economics' Yue said the weakness in loan demand is partly structural,"reflecting a loss of confidence in the housing market and the uncertainty caused by recurrent disruptions from China's zero-COVID strategy."Sources last week told Reuters that China will guarantee new onshore bond issues by a few select private developers to support the sector, which accounts for a quarter of the national GDP.
Property Property Latest News, Property Property Headlines
Similar News:You can also read news stories similar to this one that we have collected from other news sources.
Source: ChannelNewsAsia - 🏆 6. / 66 Read more »
Source: ChannelNewsAsia - 🏆 6. / 66 Read more »
Source: ChannelNewsAsia - 🏆 6. / 66 Read more »