China's bank credits fell considerably in April after staying above 1 trillion yuan for three straight months, with yuan-denominated new loans standing at 591.8 billion yuan (about 86.65 billion U.S. dollars), the People's Bank of China said Monday.

It brings outstanding loans in financial institutions up 29.72 percent to 35.55 trillion yuan by the end of April.

The country has pumped 4.58 trillion yuan (670 billion U.S. dollars) of new loans into the economy in the first quarter to stimulate growth.

The figure is already nearing 5 trillion yuan of new loans targeted for the whole year. In March alone, new loans increased by a record 1.89 trillion yuan.

The reminbi deposit increased by 1.03 trillion yuan in April, making the outstanding deposit 53.29 trillion yuan, up 26.21 percent.

In the first-quarter monetary policy report released earlier this month, the central bank said it would continue to instruct financial institutions to extend new loans, despite the earlier surge.

(Xinhua News Agency May 11, 2009)