BEIJING (Reuters) – Chinese banks extended 260 billion yuan ($36.26 billion) in new yuan loans in July, down from the previous month and undershooting analysts’ forecasts, highlighting weak demand as a prolonged property downturn and job insecurity drag on business and consumer confidence.
Analysts polled by Reuters had expected new yuan loans would come in at 450 billion yuan last month, down sharply from 2.13 trillion yuan the previous month but more than the 345.9 billion yuan a year earlier.
The People’s Bank of China (PBOC) does not provide monthly breakdowns but Reuters calculated the July figures based on the bank’s Jan-July data released on Tuesday, compared with the Jan-June figure.
The PBOC said new yuan loans totalled 13.53 trillion yuan for the first seven months of the year.
Growth in broad M2 money supply accelerated last month to 6.3% from a year earlier, above estimates of 6.1% forecast in the Reuters poll and 6.2% in June.
Growth in outstanding yuan loans slowed to 8.7% compared with 8.8% in June. Analysts had expected a 8.8% growth.
($1 = 7.1705 Chinese yuan renminbi)
(Reporting by Kevin Yao and Ellen Zhang; Editing by Andrew Heavens)
