China's money supply growth started to show signs of easing in September after months of rapid increases, but much remains to be done to keep its growth at an appropriate pace.

Largely due to its monetary policy movements, particularly a hike in required bank reserves, the central People's Bank of China (PBOC) said in its third-quarter monetary policy report on Monday that: "Overall, the tendency of rapid credit growth is starting to come under control."

M2, the broad measure of money supply that covers cash in circulation and all deposits, stood at 21.4 trillion yuan (US$2.6 trillion) at the end of last month, up 20.7 percent from a year earlier.

The pace was down from 20.8 percent at the end of June and a recent high of 21.6 percent was recorded for the month of August.

Financial institutions lent 690.5 billion yuan (US$83 billion) in new renminbi loans in the third quarter of this year, which was 282.3 billion yuan (US$34 billion) less than the second quarter.

But it is too early for China's monetary policymakers to heave a sigh of relief. Aggregate outstanding renminbi loans rose by 2.5 trillion yuan (US$301 billion) in the first nine months of the year, which was 624 billion yuan (US$75 billion) more than the total loan increases for all of 2002.

Chinese banks stepped up lending this year largely as a result of improved economic activity and partly as an effort to dilute their non-performing loan ratios.

"Currently, the growth of loans by financial institutions is still on the fast side," according to a statement from the PBOC.

The central institution announced a 1 percentage point hike in the required reserve ratio at commercial banks in August - to 7 percent - which was estimated to have frozen 150 billion yuan (US$1.8 billion) in funds and was believed to be a major reason behind the easing.

The bank noted that while new loans rose rapidly, the lending structure continued to improve, with more funds being pumped into small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and agriculture.

The two underfunded areas were widely cited by economists as evidence that the aggregate money supply growth has so far failed to effectively address structural imbalances.

Representatives from the PBOC said 51.7 percent of new loans in the first half of this year were channeled to SMEs, a slight 0.7 percentage point up on a year-on-year basis.

As much as 63 percent of loans granted on commercial bills went to SMEs, and agricultural loans in the first three quarters jumped by 30 percent to 651.5 billion yuan (US$78 billion) from a year earlier, according to the representatives.

The bank highlighted the risk in the high growth of loans to the property market, especially those lent to real estate developers, warning against a "systematic credit risk."

Real estate development loans rose by 135 billion yuan (US$16 billion) in the first three quarters, nearly three times that of the loan increases for the same period last year.

(China Daily October 29, 2003)