NEW yuan loans fell to a six-month low in April, a sign of policy-makers’ possible reluctance to overstimulate the economy.
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The central government collected 644.3 billion yuan in fiscal revenue, up 2.4 percent year on year, while the total collected by local governments rose 24.7 percent to 908 billion yuan.
BEIJING – Chinese banks sharply cut back new lending in April after a record first-quarter credit spree, reinforcing views that the country’s leaders have turned more cautious about the risks of over-stimulating the cooling economy.
In April, China’s banking system underwrote 555.6 billion yuan in new loans, a sharp fall from 1.37 trillion yuan in March, and well below the street estimate of 800 billion yuan.
The results came after China reported a 6.7% economic growth in the first quarter of the year, its slowest pace in a quarter century.
“The decline in companies’ need for loans and rising credit risks are also concerns caused by excessive credit expansion”, it said.
Thanks to the warming housing market in major cities, real estate business taxes went up 11 percent year on year to 31.5 billion yuan.
While growth in Germany doubled, Berlin’s economy ministry warned it would slow in the second quarter and economists said weaker exports to slowing emerging markets like China would eventually begin to tell on demand.
The ministry also says fiscal expenditures reached 5.44 trillion yuan in April.
“Growth in our measure of outstanding broad credit which combines TSF and government bonds rose to a 26-month high in April”.
“Optimism from earlier this year that policy stimulus in China would provide more support for economic growth in Asia appears to be fading”, said Lee Hardman, a currency analyst with Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi in London.
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In a report, the credit rating agencies said SOE liabilities stood at 115 percent of gross domestic product (GDP), far exceeding levels seen in countries such as Japan and South Korea where the state sector also plays a significant role.
