SHANGHAI/SINGAPORE (Reuters) – China’s central bank cut the borrowing cost of its medium-term policy loans for the first time in 10 months on Thursday, in line with expectations, as Beijing ramps up stimulus measures to shore up a shaky economic recovery.
The move comes just days after it lowered two key short-term policy rates, a sign that authorities are increasingly concerned about the economy’s fragility despite the dismantling of tough COVID measures in December. Activity data to be released later on Thursday morning was expected to point to further weakness.
The cuts could also pave the way for reductions in China’s benchmark lending rates when they are set next Tuesday. Data this week showed a sharp slowdown in broad credit growth in May.
The People’s Bank of China (PBOC) said it lowered the rate on 237 billion yuan ($33.09 billion) worth of one-year medium-term lending facility (MLF) loans to some financial institutions by 10 basis points (bps) to 2.65%, from 2.75% previously.
In a Reuters poll of 33 market watchers conducted this week, all respondents predicted a cut to the MLF rate, with 94% of them expected a 10-basis-point cut.
Recent data has shown China’s recovery is stalling as domestic and global demand falters and the crisis-hit property sector fails to gain traction, raising expectations that authorities need to do more to spur growth and keep a lid on unemployment.
“Policy stimulus expectations have jumped, and the market wants to see changes in fiscal and credit policies next,” said analysts at BNP Paribas, adding that policy easing can be expected given slowing exports, the struggling property sector and shaky local government finances.
But analysts say policymakers in Beijing may be wary of unleashing more aggressive stimulus measures while other global central banks are raising interest rates to combat inflation, which could risk further capital outflows from China. Its yuan currency has already lost nearly 4% so far this year, skidding to six-month lows.
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“In the next nine months… we now expect the central bank to continue its monetary easing cycle with an additional 30 bps policy rate cuts in total, 50 bps of RRR cuts and 60-80 bps of mortgage rate cuts for both new and existing home loans,” economists at Barclays said in a note.
Goldman Sachs said an expected cut in banks’ reserve requirement ratio (RRR) may be postponed to the third quarter, as historically the central bank has almost never cut the policy rate and reserve ratio within the same month.
With 200 billion yuan ($27.93 billion) worth of MLF loans set to expire this month, Thursday’s operation resulted in a net 37 billion yuan ($5.17 billion) of fresh fund injection into the banking system.
The central bank also injected 2 billion yuan ($279.14 million) through seven-day reverse repos at 1.9%, it said in an online statement.
($1 = 7.1615 Chinese yuan renminbi)
(Reporting by Li Gu in Shanghai and Tom Westbrook in Singapore; Editing by Kim Coghill & Shri Navaratnam)
