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China March M2 money up 17.3%

(Reuters)
Updated: 2007-04-13 20:28

Annual growth in China's broad M2 money supply eased to 17.3 percent in March from 17.8 percent in February, sources familiar with central bank data said on Tuesday.

The median forecast of 14 economists polled by Reuters was for a 17.5 percent rise.

Related readings:  Money supply grows, deposit shrinks in January  Money supply in line with trend  M2 growth bounces back in October

The People'sBank of China(PBOC) is expected to release the official figures in the coming week.

The central bank said last Thursday that it would again increase by 0.5 percentage point the proportion of deposits that banks must hold in reserve, effective April 16, extending a campaign to rein in liquidity and credit growth that threaten to knock the economy off keel.

It was the sixth increase in the reserve requirement ratio since last June. The central bank has also raised interest rates three times since last April.

Bank lending remained robust in March, the sources said. Banks extended 441.6 billion yuan ($57.1 billion) in yuan-denominated loans in March, they said, compared with 413.8 billion yuan in February and 567.6 billion yuan in January.

That would bring total new yuan loans in the first quarter to 1.423 trillion yuan, almost half of the central bank's target of 2.9 trillion yuan for all of 2007.

The sources added that smaller lenders led the charge in extending credit in March. The "Big Four" state banks only extended 126.1 billion yuan of credit during that period, they said, just 28.6 percent of the total.